Writing Right

Helping and assisting writers

Welcome to Writing Right. This is the first column and I hope to post new installments at least every month.

This column is about writing, writing in English, writing papers and stuff you would want to get published. How to put it together and what to look out for when trying to placate editors and other gatekeepers.

You would have queries and opinions, and I hope to be able to respond one-on-one to what bothers you when you try to write. Do contact me about anything writing related. I repeat this "call for problems" at the bottom of the post too.

This column is about writing, writing in English, writing papers and stuff you would want to get published.

There are also other kinds of writing that cause problems of course. In school we all (or maybe just nearly all) had composition classes and we have been bothered by how little things can be picked on and - to the writer at least - be blown out of all proportion.

That goes for English as a second or foreign language too. When studying EFL/ESL, you may even have been told that three words put together in English it is a "composition," something that would be a brake on writing, and a surprise to people using English. But nowadays we all write emails and text with all with all our friends, so maybe this sad classroom specific "composition" will die out.

I have been assisting writers for many years and always found it challenging, sometimes writing is difficult to understand and sometimes writers will not write as they are told to. I hope to hear back with queries about what puzzles you and holds you back from writing fluently.

Recently I had someone query a definite article at the top of a product name (like The Acme Stapler). This person claimed, no doubt truthfully, that a teacher had insisted that "you must always to put the indefinite article, never the definite article, before a proper name" (An Acme Stapler), and the writer had lived happily without knowing any different. I told that writer to think about the reader, if the reader knows what an Acme stapler is then there will be no confusion if we use "the," and that it would even be considered right - by most people.

So it is not just editors that have to be placated. There is the reader, but what does this (usually unknown) person know that we can assume is really known? This is where convention comes in and where rules and regulations for how to put sentences together originate, and where we may end up disagreeing.

So when you are writing, think about your potential reader first. If you cannot imagine what this person can understand, ask someone who could be a reader of your stuff. If there is no one around you can ask me. I'll have an opinion.

There was another "mistaken belief" I ran into a short while back. One of my acquaintances had been told that the Japanese 多少　（tashoo） must be translated/written as "more or less" in English. You know, in Japanese we say 多少 when we don't have a number to put on something, and it can imply quite a lot of things. In English however, if we say that "a cake contains more or less of something" - well, then you are not saying anything really, or rather you are saying something in a way so your reader can't know what you mean. As a result "tashoo" sometimes becomes "some" but much of the time it can be left alone and not translated at all - something that deeply irks the literal translators among us.

When you write, the rule is never ever to use a dictionary. If you don't know a word or phrase try to write around it, don't look it up.

And now for a piece of useful advice. It is about how you should use dictionaries. This may be the first time this particular tip has been made available to a Japanese audience, at least from how little known it seems to be. When you write, the rule is never ever to use a dictionary. If you don't know a word or phrase try to write around it, don't look it up. Why? You ask. Well, because you are quite likely to pick the wrong word when you ply your dictionary in the dark. From English into your own language a dictionary if often helpful, but the other way - when you are looking for just the right word or phrase in English, say from Japanese - it never ends happily.

However, there are times when we cannot avoid using a dictionary to find an English equivalent for something, what to do then? Well, look it up, but before you use the word you find you need to check it the other way.

So, if you start with a Japanese word, first find a likely English term and then go to an English-Japanese dictionary and try to sort out what the English word you have pounced on means in Japanese. That will give you a good feeling for how well you chose, and you will end up being right more of the time. Still, the basic rule is: Never rely on a dictionary when you are writing. Then, like I said at the start, ask someone else and see what they think, others are pretty good at shooting down "funny" words you may have chanced on. And I didn't even start to discuss how to use the internet.

I will stop here - for this time. If you have a writing related question ask, and I will try to answer. The site will say how to get in contact with me. I look forward to hear from you.

« Coming soon... | Main | Sentences, Paragraphs - how long and how many »

• Rules for writing - Micro and Macro
• Advance organizers, redundancy, word choice, punctuation, and more little stuff explained.
• How to pick the correct article (at the top of nouns) most of the time

• How to pick the correct article (at the top of nouns) most of the time
    - Mr.Saeed
  
• Sentences, Paragraphs - how long and how many
    - John
    - Torkil Christensen