I Did Not Say That, Part 3: Ideas vs. Verbiage

In a writing workshop,  I might give a sentence like the one below instructing students to eliminate unnecessary words without changing the writer's intention:

I am writing this email to inform you that you are required to stop conducting your investigation right away on a temporary basis due to the fact that Jefferson is taking a position of not being cooperative in response to your interview. (42 words)

Here is the suggested solution to this editing exercise:

You must immediately discontinue investigating until Jefferson cooperates with your interview. (11 words)

Of course, we do not need the false start, I am writing this email, to understand the sentence. Other longwinded phrases are replaceable by single words (are required = must, conducting your investigation = investigating, right away = immediately, due to the fact that = because,  not being cooperative = noncooperative). Still other phrases mean nothing in the context (is taking a position of, in response to). We also can find ways of implying the meaning with fewer words (until Jefferson cooperates implies well enough that Jefferson is not cooperating and that the discontinuation is temporary). 

Some students miss the point of this exercise by dropping words necessary to the meaning, such as temporarily or immediately, which would change the writer's intent. For this reason, I make a point of discussing the differences among revising, editing, and proofreading, which we should do in this order:

• Revising – a matter of content and structure, when we move, add, or delete ideas to support our point and address the reader's concerns (purposefulness, completeness, organization).
• Editing – a matter of style, when we change the expression of language to best express our intention (courtesy, clarity, conciseness, correctness).  
• Proofreading – a matter of detecting overlooked errors (layout, typos). 

By the time we edit, we should have already determined what goes into the message; we are merely finessing the language, massaging the expression. People mistake my saying delete unnecessary words by eliminating ideas essential to the meaning of the sentence. If it adds value, keep it in; if it does not, out it goes.

I Did Not Say That, Part 2: "To Be"

When I suggest using action verbs in place of being verbs for greater clarity, I am not saying to never use being verbs. As I mentioned in a previous WORDS ON THE LINE post, being verbs (e.g., am, are, is, was, were, be, being, been) have their place in excellent writing. We need to use to be in continuous tense, as in I am running for mayor, or in general statements where a copulative will do, such as She is an engineer or He is Australian.

Nevertheless, using action verbs makes our writing more precise, more clear. Let's revisit those three to be examples in the previous paragraph. Instead of writing I am running for mayor, I can make am running a noun and find a more exact action verb, such as By running for mayor, I plan to transform our town into a more economically vibrant community. Rather than write She is an engineer, I could choose the more informative She graduated from Cornell University with an industrial engineering degree. And I can skip past the man's national identity (He is Australian) toward a more purposeful He lives in Australia but works for a Chinese company. 

I raise the action-verb-over-being-verb issue because we tend toward laziness as writers when over-relying on ambiguous being verbs. So here's the tip: Substitute being verbs for action verbs, unless you are sure that the being alternative is just what you want to say.

I Did Not Say That, Part 1: Passive Voice

Sometimes we should record ourselves when giving writing advice. Over the years, I have heard some disturbing compliments from people who took one or more of my writing workshops. What they said showed me that they did not understand the teaching point. In other words, I did not get the job done. That hurts. I am devoting a dozen posts on these teaching points to set the record straight.

Compliment: "Thanks to you, I never use passive voice."

Reality: I have never told anyone to never use passive voice. The people who have claimed I have either do not know the difference between active and passive voice despite my having taught it to them, or they do not mean never.

Intention: I have written a lot about passive voice in my book The Art of On-the-Job Writing and on this blog. I know the value of passive voice, so I would not tell writers to never use it. Nevertheless, using passive voice could cause ambiguity, wordiness, or awkwardness, and using active voice could create clarity, conciseness, and fluency. For these reasons, I do tell students (1) to know the difference between active and passive voice, (2) to prefer active voice, and (3) to practice transposing passive voice to active voice and vice-versa.  

The posts in this blog on passive voice (type "passive voice" in the search bar) should prove useful if you need help in this area. 

Plagiarism Detection Services from a Friend of WORDS ON THE LINE

My mantra as a writing trainer is this: stay fresh. Update your writing skillset by practicing the craft, reading diversely, and researching new ideas in rhetoric. This approach will keep you at the top of your game. You can imagine how delighted I am when I see one of my students in a writing course or readers of this blog heeding this advice. That's why Maja Ampov made my today so cool. 

I probably was wondering whether anyone was reading my posts when I wrote more than nine years ago about the value of using a plagiarism detection service since the editors and professors who read your submissions do. But today I received an email from Maja proving that lifelines are all over the internet. She thanked me for that post but went two giant steps further by 1) independently researching plagiarism detection services and 2) contacting me about her findings. She wrote, 

While this tool you mentioned works great, I got curious and started looking for other options and I came across this article (with) a list of similar tools: https://www.websiteplanet.com/blog/best-plagiarism-checking-tools/

What I like the most about this article is their honesty and objectiveness when choosing/ranking the best and more accurate plagiarism check tools available out there, in addition, they suggested a few free tools, so it’s great for someone who would want to try it.

Maja recommended I add her suggestion to WORDS ON THE LINE and concluded with the most beautiful complimentary closing I've ever read:

In hope I helped back,

Maja

Oh did you ever, Maja. A big thanks to you!