Write To Be Understood

One of my pet peeves as an editor is reading material that sucks overall—wrong word choices, faulty grammar, a story that has no focus, and a feeble grasp of the English language. When I meet these kinds of articles, my eyes glaze over and by the second paragraph, my mind shuts down, and I start screaming.

If I’m totally pressed for time and there’s no way to have the writer re-do the piece, I start crying because then, I’ll be facing two things: (a) if I refuse to use the article, I write it (less hassle but more work); or (b) if I brave my way into that mangled piece and try to make sense out of it, I know I'm in for a spell editing with a heavy hand through each word, phrase, sentence, and paragraph.

When I do have to edit, that’s when terror hits me: I know I’m in for a tortuous time and it would take me a while before I start the painful process. The piece would lie for hours on my work table, a quiet nagging that’s got its talons sunk into my guilty conscience, relenting only when I start work on it. Sometimes though, thoughts of murder and mayhem fleet through my mind as I wade through the material, wanting to mangle the writer as much as s/he’d mangled my peace of mind.

I used to wonder why there are writers on oDesk who accept a fixed rate of $2 or less for every 500-word article they write. I even tangled up with a buyer who insisted, quite forcefully I might add, that it was the going rate and I might want to bring mine down. I refused, telling him that the quality I put into my writing isn’t worth the piddling cents he was offering me.

Now, I’m no longer wondering why.

I’ve had a recent run in with a re-writer on oDesk who was quite proud, mind you, of her "excellent English writing skills." Her demo re-write was acceptable and like I told her, there were “instances of brilliance” in her writing--some "unique and refreshing" ways of "putting it." But when the actual re-writes came in, she brought ‘unique and refreshing’ to a whole new different level: I couldn’t understand what she was talking about!

Which brings me to the one aim of every writer: make readers understand an idea or concept so they can use it.

I heard somewhere that a writer writes because s/he has something to say. Implied in that is the intent to move people so they can do something with or about what was said. Which doesn’t happen if you leave them clueless and asking questions at the end of your story.

It’s a tired, old writing school cliché that shouldn’t even be repeated: write to be understood. Don’t use big words and if you have to, make sure that you know what those big words mean.

Simplify, simplify, simplify. Particularly if you’re writing for a general audience, assume that you’re talking to a seven year old so use language that’s fit for that grade level. It’s not that your readers are stupid; it’s just that you don’t want there to be any misunderstanding.

You say it’s the editor’s job to set your writing straight. But think about this: it’s no longer your creation and it shouldn’t be your byline if the editor has already used a ruthless, snipping hand to your piece.