The sensible way to write
By Jose A. Carillo
People ask me sometimes if there’s a quick formula for effective writing. My answer is yes, I know of one, but I can't guarantee how quick it will work for anyone aspiring to write better. In fact, like most people who make a living from writing and editing, I arrived at the formula not in just one burst of enlightenment but through years and years of practice. That formula, reduced to its simplest terms, is this:
Effective Writing = Good semantics + Good syntax + Sensibility
Before discussing the formula, I want to make it clear that by effective writing, I don’t necessarily mean great prose. I only mean writing that gets our message across clearly and understandably. If you have the natural gift or innate facility to write novels, plays, or movie scripts that can impress audiences, that will be great! But if you happen not to have it, don’t simply bewail your fate. It’s never too late to make yourself do much better with the written word. So long as you clearly understand how the formula’s three variables work, that goal should be well within your reach inyour early years.
The first writing variable is, of course, our vocabulary. I use the term semantics rather loosely for this variable so it can cover not only the acquisition of words but also the understanding of their various meanings. This variable is actually the easiest to load in our favor. In English, by just learning 10 new words every day, we can enrich our vocabulary by 3,600 words a year; by the time we are 50 years old, there should be more than 200,000 words at our command. That would be about the same number as all of the basic words in the English language outside of archaic words, scientific terms, and jargon—more than what we will really ever need to write effectively.
The second variable is admittedly more difficult to master: syntax or grammar. We are all supposed to have started learning it since we were toddlers. But since English is only a second language for most us (here I’m referring to Filipinos in particular), we learned to speak the language only gradually and discovered the intricacies of its grammar much later. Gaps in our English syntax are therefore inevitable. Thus, even if we have a superior intellect, we may not necessarily be able to speak or write English as well as its native speakers do.
An excellent grasp of English semantics and syntax will be great, of course, but we all know that this in itself won’t be enough. It doesn’t guarantee the ability to write good prose. There are in fact many highly educated people whose spoken English is beyond reproach, but who can’t write a clear, understandable, and interesting sentence that goes longer than six words. Their problem is that when they sit down to write, alone and without the stimulus of a live listener, they can only write stilted, unfocused thoughts addressed to no one in particular. In short, their writing doesn’t communicate adequately.
This happens because peoplein general don’t know that effective writing actually needs a very important third variable. Some people call it “sensitivity” but I prefer to use the term sensibility for the variable in writing that creates sensation, feeling, and understanding in the reader through the written word. The “sensible” writer is one who can make his prose resonate or connect with the unseen reader. The ability to achieve this resonance is obviously a much more elusive factor than both semantics and syntax. But it is unfortunate that it’s not well recognized and formally taught in schools. What’s often learned as the principal goal of writing is self-expression, which is the opposite of sensibility.
The obsession with self-expression is, I think, the single biggest reason why many people, although intelligent, cannot write effectively. They don't realize that writing actually must do the exact opposite of self-expression to work with a reader. They become so busy giving vent in writing to what they feel and think, what they know, and what they believe in. They are unable to grasp the fact that for the readers to understand and appreciate these things, they must write only with words, meanings, and mental images that are already in their readers’ heads. The reality is that these will often be not the words, meanings, and mental images that come naturally to us.
The sensible way to write, therefore, is to clearly understand that we are not writing for ourselves but for others. Writing is essentially speaking silently to an unseen listener. Our terms of reference when we write shouldn’t be our own intellect or accumulated knowledge; it should instead be our best estimate of the quality of mind and temperament of our readers. And it should be obvious by now that the only levels of vocabulary, grammar, and language that will work for this purpose are primarily those of our readers, not our own levels.
This brings us back to this formula that I offered at the very outset of this essay:
Effective Writing = Good semantics + Good syntax + Sensibility
Only by carefully balancing this equation can we really hope to make our writing truly clear, understandable, and interesting to our target readers.
This essay first appeared in my “English Plain and Simple” column in The Manila Times on January 3, 2003.
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