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***** As a customer of Innovative Communication Solutions, you get a free subscription to the bimonthly e-mail newsletter, Ask the Editor. Each issue tackles a common problem all writers—from business professionals to professional writers—often face. You can also get expert opinion on any writing problem. Just "Ask the Editor." ***** ASK THE EDITOR Vol. 1, Issue 2 March/April 2000 http://kevinorf.tripod.com ----- IN THIS ISSUE: WRITER’S BLOCK - NOTE FROM THE EDITOR - OVERCOMING WRITER’S BLOCK - WHAT CAN BE DONE - GETTING STARTED WRITING - TIPS TO KEEP WRITING - QUICK TIPS FOR COMBATING WRITER’S BLOCK - QUOTE - QUESTION FOR READERS - PREVIOUS READER REPLIES - ASK THE EDITOR QUESTION ----- NOTE FROM THE EDITOR After publishing the initial issue recently, I received a flurry of new subscriptions. Thanks for the interest! Please e-mail me and let me know what you’d like to see covered in future issues and feel free to make any suggestions about how we can improve the format or content of this newsletter.
If you find Ask the Editor useful, please take a moment and recommend it to your friends and associates. Just have them send an e-mail to kevinorf@netwurx.net with "Subscribe to Ask the Editor" in the "Subject" box.
Also, be sure to check out our Web site at http://kevinorf.tripod.com for more free writing tips and advice.
Sincerely, "The Editor" ----- OVERCOMING WRITER’S BLOCK Whether you’re a business professional writing an important proposal or a professional writer meeting weekly deadlines, you can’t afford to have writer’s block. Yet writer’s block plagues everyone. What can you do?
I sometimes run screaming out of my office. It doesn’t seem to help much but it alleviates a bit of the frustration. I also work out of my home and my kids don’t seem to mind, but this probably won’t work for you. ----- WHAT CAN BE DONE Everyone experiences writer’s block. Here are common causes and solutions: Setting unrealistic expectations: The writing you produce will never meet the ideal in your mind. Don’t worry about it. Just get words on the page. Remember that you can edit later.
Focusing on mechanics: This is the number one cause for freeze up. Don’t worry about getting grammar, spelling, punctuation, usage, mechanics, or structure exactly right. Think of your draft as the first step in the writing process. Later you will edit and proofread.
Being too self-conscious: Don’t worry about how you sound in your first draft. Remember that you can rewrite as many times as you want to get it right.
Trying to be someone else: Don’t try to write like someone else. Use your own voice.
Writing for someone new: Writing a memo to a president or vice-president is always fun. Try to be natural and use your own voice. Get feedback on your drafts from coworkers.
Praise: After receiving praise for a concisely written proposal or business report, we all tend to set even higher standards than before. As a result, we put more pressure on ourselves to always perform and get extremely disappointed when we don’t. The best advice is to trust yourself.
Telling bad news: Writing a report on a bad sales month or writing a memo about an unpleasant situation with another employee is difficult. Your censor kicks in. Get down what you want to say. Then sit on it for a day or two before editing it. Have a trusted coworker read it for tact and diplomacy. ----- GETTING STARTED WRITING Starting a writing project is when you’re most susceptible to writer’s block. Staring at a blank page only seems to make it worse. Here’s what you can do to get started: - Time and place. Set aside a time for writing when you won’t be bothered. Write during a part of the day when you won’t be interrupted, for example, early morning or late afternoon. If possible, forward your phone and shut your door. Or go to a quiet part of your building.
- Don’t worry about failure. Consider your first draft an experiment.
- If you’re stuck, freewrite. Freewriting is completely uninhibited writing. Just get words on paper without pausing to correct typos or even to add punctuation. This works miracles.
- Dictate your draft. Try to write like you speak. Talk your draft out loud.
- Work with others. Ask a coworker what he or she would say or how to say it.
- Write intro last. This is always the hardest part to write. Usually you know how to write it better after you’ve written the rest of the draft.
- Sleep on it. Sometimes it’s better to put off writing, especially just after researching or planning. Allow your ideas to ferment.
- Practice, practice, practice. Most of us write a lot as part of our jobs. If you don’t, try to write something everyday. Start communicating by e-mail instead of by phone. Write more memos instead of directly communicating. ----- TIPS TO KEEP WRITING - Keep going. Looking back will cause you to freeze up. You’ll see an error and start focusing on mistakes. You’ll realize the structure or wording is not quite right. Or you might be tempted to check a fact or detail. Remember that you can go back and edit and proofread later. Don’t look back.
- Set quantifiable goals. Establish the number of words or pages you want to write for a given time period or project. Quantity will keep you focused on getting the writing done. You can work on quality later.
- A thousand mile journey starts with a single step. Focus on the part, not the whole. Writing a 50 page proposal or business plan is daunting. Writing a paragraph or page at a time isn’t. ----- QUICK TIPS FOR COMBATING WRITER’S BLOCK - Write introduction last - Start with the section you are most comfortable writing - Freewrite or brainstorm - Take a break - Keep a notebook or journal - Find similar memos, letters, or reports to give you ideas ----- QUOTE "Easy writing makes hard reading." Ernest Hemingway ----- QUESTION FOR READERS How do you deal with writer’s block? E-mail us and let us know. Your responses will be posted in the next issue! ----- PREVIOUS READER REPLIES Are you guilty of using jargon? When? Or share a humorous example you’ve seen recently…
"Don't use 25-cent words when nickel words will do," is the way a long-ago editor/teacher referred to jargon. That is, don't say, "Abide until the lactating ruminant quadrupeds retrovert to their permanent domicile." Instead, say, "Wait until the cows come home." John Woodruff
Great advice, John!
Here’s a great example from an actual press release forwarded to us by Joan Stewart (the company’s name has been changed to protect the guilty): "Acme’s new retail management system is highly reliable and scalable and includes sophisticated functionality, including integrated e-commerce capabilities." (Whatever that means!) Joan publishes the Publicity Hound, a bi-monthly subscription newsletter featuring "tips, tricks and tools for free (or really cheap) publicity." Check out her Web site at http://www.publicityhound.com for free publicity tips. ----- ASK THE EDITOR QUESTION Here’s a great question submitted by Paula Bargiel, Manuscript Editor, RSNA: Do you think it's correct to have the punctuation outside the quotation marks when referring to a word as a word in the following way, and if so, why? Example: The title, abstract, and medical subject heading, or MeSH, were searched for the index terms and text words "prostate", "cancer", and "staging".
Over the years, I’ve come to realize punctuation is more of an art than a science. The bottom line is to put the reader first and use punctuation to make your writing as clear and as unambiguous as possible (this is especially true when using commas and hyphens, it seems). As the old saying goes, know when you can break the rules.
Let’s break this question down a bit. First there’s the issue of using quotation marks with other punctuation. Typically, the period and comma always go within the quotation marks. Other marks including the dash, semicolon, question mark, and exclamation point go within the quotation marks only when they apply to the quoted material, but go outside when they apply to the whole sentence. Be sure to check the style guide you use or your house style as this may vary, but that’s typically the rule of thumb.
Second, there’s the issue of using quotations when referring to an unfamiliar term or referring to a word as a word. In general, the punctuation should be within the quotation marks. There are exceptions; for example, the Chicago Manual of Style discusses the use of putting punctuation outside of single quotations to mark linguistic, phonetic, theological, or philosophic terms, but this is rare.
Another exception is when ambiguity might occur, for example: To find out more about the Chicago Cubs, enter the words "Chicago", "Cubs", "baseball", and "team" into the Gottafindit search engine. In this case, you don’t want your reader to enter a comma as part of the search, so it’s better to move it out of the quotes. (And at a time when we are conditioned to type URLs and e-mail addresses exactly as they appear, it wouldn’t be unusual for readers to make this mistake.)
Stumped by a style issue or perplexed by a punctuation problem? In each issue, we answer a question submitted by a reader. Send your question today! **** Copyright 2000 Kevin Orfield Need an immediate quote on a writing project? Or need an estimate for a customized business writing seminar? Call a writing consultant you can depend on. Kevin Orfield, MA Writing Consultant 262-236-0110 Fax: 262-236-0120 Innovative Communication Solutions 10321 N. Versailles Ct. Mequon, WI 53092 Visit our Web site! http://kevinorf.tripod.com Subscription Notes: Feel free to pass this newsletter on to friends and colleagues. - To subscribe others, just have them send an e-mail to kevinorf@netwurx.net with "Subscribe to Ask the Editor" in the "Subject" box. - To unsubscribe at any time, simply send an e-mail to kevinorf@netwurx.net with "Unsubscribe to Ask the Editor" in the "Subject" box. But then, why would you want to miss out on free advice? **** |
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