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not be complete without words from the wise.
You know how, when you’re watching a speaker, you can
tell if he or she is nervous? There are those tell-tale signs:
trembling hands and voice, lack of eye contact, perspiration,
twitches, lots of "ummms," and a myriad of other
idiosyncratic gestures and signs that show he or she is not
fully at ease in front of an audience.
Did you know that I can spot those same tell-tale signs in
your writing?
If you’re not completely confident in your skills as a writer,
and in what you’ve written in particular, there are warning
signs that can tip off an editor or reader. I find them in
query letters all the time, and, to a lesser extent, in articles
and stories themselves.
The first tip-off? Stilted language.
Stilted language is formal and proper. It employs big words
when small ones would suffice just fine. It "sounds" canned
and over-prepared.
Example: "Marjorie was required to submit to a physician’s
examination prior to the interview in which she would be
considered for the position."
Doesn’t it sound like the writer is working too hard to
impress here? Like she’s trying to SOUND like a journalist?
"Real writers" don’t have to use big words and serious
language to effectively get their point across. In fact, the
more direct and simple the language, the better.
"Marjorie had to go for a doctor’s exam before the company
would consider her for the job."
Is it "dumbing down" your language? No. It’s cutting
through the thicket and allowing the words to flow as
naturally as they would in your speech—just with the
benefit of editing. It’s being purposely as understandable
as possible, so that if someone was skimming your
query/article quickly, he would still get the meaning,
without tripping over S.A.T. words or unfamiliar phrasing.
Many professional writers (myself included) believe in
writing first drafts quickly, so as not to give our brains
enough time to censor, doubt, and question each word as it
flows through us and onto the paper. When I write,
whether it’s an article, story, or just about anything else, I
pretend I’m talking to a friend. I want my friend to hear
about this interesting thing I learned. So, I tell him in the
same manner I’d tell him if he were sitting next to me in my
living room. I don’t need to impress him (or confuse him!) by
"spicing up" my writing with words like "proceed" and
"consume" when the words "go" and "eat" would have
worked just fine.
Stilted language is a sign that the writer is not confident
that her OWN words—the words she would really use—are
good enough. It’s puffing up the writing to suit an editor.
But think about this: the more formal and convoluted the
language, the harder the editor will have to think just to
get through the piece. Too much thinking equals rejection,
unless you’re writing for an academic or very intellectual
market. Editors want clarity. They don’t want to have to
reread sentences to get the meaning of your words. Once
the eyes glaze over, you’re in trouble.
Another giveaway: namby-pamby qualifiers that shift the
responsibility for the statements away from the author.
Example: "It seemed to onlookers that Mayor Ross might
possibly have been suffering from exhaustion."
Were you one of the onlookers? Was it pretty obvious that
the guy was falling asleep at the podium? Then don’t shift
the observation into a passive voice. Be confident in your
own powers of observation and reasoning. "Mayor Ross
seemed exhausted."
The same goes for overuse of "experts" and studies when
none are needed. We all know that you’re supposed to get
eight hours of sleep a night, right? Then why do people
insist on writing, "According to doctors, eight hours of sleep
per night is optimal"? You don’t need the doctor to say that
for you. If you know it to be true, you can skip the
"according to doctors" and get straight to your point,
without pulling out of your own voice.
Another example: "usually," "probably," "most likely,"
"often," etc. Watch for these words in your writing. There
are times when they’ll be necessary—and, then again,
there are plenty of times when you can omit them.
I once had a psychology professor who prefaced every
statement she made with the words "basically," "usually,"
or "typically." It undermined what she was saying, because
it felt like she was unsure of herself. When you write these
words, it translates to uncertainty—did Mary Beth go to
church on Sundays, or did she "typically" go to church on
Sundays? If she skipped once or twice a year, she went.
You don’t need a qualifier. If she skipped every other week,
then you can add a qualifier.
Be confident in what you are writing. Every time you shift
away responsibility for your words by attributing them to
someone else, or by watering them down with adverbs,
you give the reader leeway to question whether or not you
really know what you’re talking about.
Another tip-off: fear of making a point.
Similar to the problem with too many qualifiers, pulling out
of your article too soon shows a lack of confidence in your
message. Let’s say you wrote an entire article about how a
certain kind of duck is going extinct. You talked about all the
reasons why it’s happening, and you explained what
people can do to help. Then you end it with a lame
conclusion like "Further studies are needed" or "Experts will
continue to examine the causes…" blah, blah. Again, if you
know that what you’ve just said is true, you don’t need to
end off with anything that detracts from your conclusion.
Sure, further studies may be conducted, but does that take
anything away from the evidence you’ve just reported? Let
your point come through loud and clear. Make the decision
to take a risk and be accountable for your words.
You don’t need to tie it all up neatly with a moral, a la
Aesop’s Fables ("And that’s why we must all stop throwing
plastic in the garbage"). Just let the strength of your entire
article carry the message—let your readers come to the
conclusions to which you’ve directed them, and don’t let
them second-guess those conclusions by giving a wishy-
washy ending.
Be bold. Be confident. And let your very best writing shine
through.
Jenna Glatzer is the editor-in-chief of Absolute Write (www.
absolutewrite.com), where writers can get a free list of more than
180 agents who are open to new writers! She is also the author of
OUTWITTING WRITER'S BLOCK AND OTHER PROBLEMS OF THE PEN
and other books for writers, which you can read about at http://www.
absolutewrite.com/jenna/books.htm if you want to make her day.
This article may be freely reprinted as long as the bio and this note
are included.
It was my very first assignment, and, as far as first assignments go, I was spoiled. This was a
good, national market—Link Magazine, to be precise. Link was a free magazine distributed in
college dorms all across America. They also had their own television station. It was an
impressive outfit.
So, I got the call one fine afternoon.
“Hi, Jenna. This is Torey at Link Magazine, and I wanted to talk about your query.”
Of course I knew what he was talking about. I only had one query. It was the only idea I’d
ever had for a magazine article; a profile of three of my college buddies who had started their
own Internet Service Provider. This was many years ago, when web-based businesses were
still novel and interesting things to talk about.
Anyway, he called to tell me I got the assignment, but it would only be a very short piece—
around 300 words. They could pay 50 cents a word, he said in an apologetic tone. I
pretended to be cool, but I didn’t even think about negotiating. I was just waiting for him to
glance over my query again, notice I didn’t mention anything about my experience, and realize
I was an amateur. A creditless loser. I rushed him off the phone, really, just hoping I’d get
through the conversation without him ever asking anything about my background. I
succeeded.
Although I had two weeks to submit the article, I thought it would look very professional if I
could show that I was the World’s Fastest Writer. He had told me he would send me a
sample copy of the magazine, but I didn’t have time to wait for that. This was my first real
assignment, for goodness sake! I had to work on it NOW.
I called my friends, and conducted about 6 hours worth of long distance phone interviews,
jotting down every word in longhand. (I thought it would have been rude of me to mention
my expenses, so I sucked up the phone bill.) I summoned all my knowledge about journalists,
which I’d derived from watching movies, of course. Journalists were thorough, and detailed,
and they got the scoop behind the scoop. So I dug deep; I asked really obscure questions
about their parents and their childhood dreams, in addition to all the relevant ones about
college and work.
Then I ran straight to the computer and wrote my first draft. It clocked in around 2,000
words. I had to cut only 1,700 of them.
And cut them, I did. I only kept the very big, fancy words. I made sure every word was
impressive and collegiate and writerly. I tried to cram everything I ever knew about these
three guys into four paragraphs. I stayed up all night with a thesaurus, editing and tweaking
until I was sure this was the most intelligent 300-word profile ever written. And I emailed it
straight to the editor.
“Hi,” he said on the phone the next day. “Um, there’s a little problem with what you’ve
submitted. It sounds like a press release, and it’s not funny. Link is funny. And irreverent.
And… you’ve never read the magazine, have you?”
“Well, no,” I admitted.
“Why don’t you just wait until you see the sample issue, and then see if you can pick up the
style?”
“Okay,” I agreed, down but not beaten.
It was absolute torture waiting the next three days, my typing fingers paralyzed while I
waited for the magazine to appear in the mailbox. When it finally did arrive, I read it cover to
cover, studying it like the Bible. It was the first time I’d ever really learned anything about the
business I’d just entered.
I had assumed I’d be a great writer in any form, mostly because I’d aced all of my English
courses in college. People paid me to help them with their term papers. Surely, that’s the
kind of writer who editors would want to hire… right?
I couldn’t have been more wrong. This magazine was informal, quirky, entertaining. It read
like a conversation among friends, rather than a Shakespearean analysis. I had just assumed
I must know how to write for magazines after reading them for so many years. I knew Link
was a college magazine, and I had read college magazines (they were fruity and talked about
goofy things like studying and glee clubs and “just saying no”). So I figured I knew what this
market was about. When I got their magazine, I started thinking about how much variation
there is within any market. In women’s mags, there’s matronly Good Housekeeping, and
there’s skin-deep Vogue. In smut, there’s classy Playboy, and then there’s anything involving
the letters “DD.”
This wake-up call made me realize I had just been a passive reader; I’d never studied my
craft. I never paid any attention to the styles, structure, and tone of magazine articles.
I rewrote that piece; gave it a wacky title, a clever hook, and short, punchy sentences. The
editor absolutely loved it. He loved it enough to stay in touch with me, even when he left the
magazine and moved on to other markets. He loved it enough to recommend me to the
publisher of the magazine when they needed an editor-in-chief for an off-shoot magazine
several years later. In penance, I learned how to study a market before I submitted queries,
let alone finished assignment.
I don’t think he ever knew that was my first assignment, and I don’t think he remembers that
awful first draft I submitted. But today, I’m so thankful that my first experience was with an
editor who was patient and kind enough to give an overeager amateur a second chance to
make her first impression.
Jenna Glatzer is the editor-in-chief of Absolute Write (www.absolutewrite.com), where writers can get a free
list of more than 180 agents who are open to new writers! She is also the author of OUTWITTING
WRITER'S BLOCK AND OTHER PROBLEMS OF THE PEN and other books for writers, which you can read
about at http://www.absolutewrite.com/jenna/books.htm if you want to make her day.
for art credits section.
