Prescriptivism in writing
Dec. 25th, 2009 12:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Short form: It doesn't work.
I run into this when I'm teaching first year writing, too. Students will ask things like "how long should the introduction be", and the answer isn't "one paragraph for a five page paper and two for a ten page paper". No, the answer is "long enough to introduce the topic and give any background information your reader needs, not so long that you start to get into your body arguments before you actually get to the body". They ask "so, is three pages too long" and I can't answer in any meaningful way without actually reading the paper. It might be. It might not. Pages are the wrong yardstick with which to measure, because it's the content that matters.
For similar reasons, the infamous advice to cut adverbs is useless when accepted and deployed uncritically. The more useful rephrasing might be: Persistently using adverbs as a shortcut, in place of giving some meaningful description of the characters' actions or thoughts, will make the story shallower, and adding them where there are already sufficient cues will make the story sloppier. The more useful initial phrasing might have been: Identify the techniques you are prone to overuse and remember to pay attention to those while you're editing.
Of course, that doesn't sound nearly so satisfyingly solid and simple, does it? It's not as catchy as "The road to hell is paved with adverbs". It sounds less like "fewer than three pages" and more like "not so long you start writing body arguments".
Prescriptive advice isn't always wrong, but it isn't going to be right, either--again, those are the wrong yardsticks. It universalizes the particular way of writing that worked for one author/reader or even a group of authors/readers. It borrows the false authority of absolutism instead of putting in the work of self-examination that might yield the far more useful explanation of why, in that particular case, a particular writing approach worked.
So to anyone who is tempted to write a how-to or a this-is-better: try to remember that your view is specific and particular, not universal, and do the 'why' work. It's just as necessary in non-fiction as it is in fiction.
I run into this when I'm teaching first year writing, too. Students will ask things like "how long should the introduction be", and the answer isn't "one paragraph for a five page paper and two for a ten page paper". No, the answer is "long enough to introduce the topic and give any background information your reader needs, not so long that you start to get into your body arguments before you actually get to the body". They ask "so, is three pages too long" and I can't answer in any meaningful way without actually reading the paper. It might be. It might not. Pages are the wrong yardstick with which to measure, because it's the content that matters.
For similar reasons, the infamous advice to cut adverbs is useless when accepted and deployed uncritically. The more useful rephrasing might be: Persistently using adverbs as a shortcut, in place of giving some meaningful description of the characters' actions or thoughts, will make the story shallower, and adding them where there are already sufficient cues will make the story sloppier. The more useful initial phrasing might have been: Identify the techniques you are prone to overuse and remember to pay attention to those while you're editing.
Of course, that doesn't sound nearly so satisfyingly solid and simple, does it? It's not as catchy as "The road to hell is paved with adverbs". It sounds less like "fewer than three pages" and more like "not so long you start writing body arguments".
Prescriptive advice isn't always wrong, but it isn't going to be right, either--again, those are the wrong yardsticks. It universalizes the particular way of writing that worked for one author/reader or even a group of authors/readers. It borrows the false authority of absolutism instead of putting in the work of self-examination that might yield the far more useful explanation of why, in that particular case, a particular writing approach worked.
So to anyone who is tempted to write a how-to or a this-is-better: try to remember that your view is specific and particular, not universal, and do the 'why' work. It's just as necessary in non-fiction as it is in fiction.
no subject
Date: 2009-12-25 06:47 pm (UTC)Ooo, writing meta! :) I completely agree with you, and have very little of use to add, but
Identify the techniques you are prone to overuse and remember to pay attention to those while you're editing.
is excellent advice. Writing is unique to the individual and everyone has to find their own strengths and weakness and figure out how to best play up the former and minimize the latter.
no subject
Date: 2009-12-25 07:04 pm (UTC)*nodnod* In context, that seems to be what King really meant. Adverbs are his personal weakness, of course he pays a lot of attention to pruning them out. He just... didn't quite manage to say that neatly.
no subject
Date: 2009-12-25 07:53 pm (UTC)They always look so disappointed when I say, "I don't know, I'll have to read the revised paper and see."
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Date: 2009-12-25 07:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-25 09:40 pm (UTC)It's fascinating to see you and Em talking about this sort of thing simply because it's all new to me - I haven't written a proper essay since school, and even then only little ones.
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Date: 2009-12-25 09:50 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2009-12-26 03:41 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2009-12-26 11:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-26 05:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-27 02:45 am (UTC)I never got the "Adverbs are wrongity-wrong-wrong all the tune for eternity" thing. I ignore it.
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Date: 2009-12-27 02:45 am (UTC)I can type in the dark. By that I mean I can't.
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Date: 2009-12-27 02:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-27 03:09 am (UTC)It was actually freeing to learn that.
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Date: 2010-01-15 08:48 pm (UTC)When other people get assigned to do the same work, they tend to trip all over themselves looking for some magic formulae that will make the report make some kind of atomic "sense" (these are IT people, mind you). I had one guy come to me with this spreadsheet that was hundreds of lines long trying to get me to tell him what data manipulations he needed to perform in order to properly define his column headings. Or something.
I was all like, "Dude, this isn't computer programming; it's writing. It's not an exact science. You figure out what message you want to convey to the reader, then you make shit up based on that. The process and form of producing the report are significantly less important than the end result."
Needless to say, I don't think he got it. I ended up making an analogy based on the concept of OOP, which of course in the long run is completely rubbish because Writing Does Not Work Like That. Bah.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-15 08:51 pm (UTC)