Writing short: It's about what you say

The wisdom of Donald Murray:"Brevity comes from selection, not compression."Me: Prune the dead limbs, then shake out the dead leaves.
— Roy Peter Clark (@RoyPeterClark) September 19, 2012

That is so true. I think when we talk about inch counts for stories -- I'm mostly thinking about projects or enterprise pieces, but it really holds for any story -- reporters can interpret that as quality reduction: If I could write 10 more inches, or 20, or 30, my story would be that much better. But if I can only write x-amount, my story's only going to be so good.

There are reasons to write longer, sometimes. But Murray's wisdom, as Clark notes, tells us it's not about the space you use to say something, it's about what you say in that space.

Joe Posnanski on writing & how words work (and don't)

How 'True Grit' dialogue went from stilted to poetic for Posnanski.

Breakdown of a suicide note

Poynter's Roy Peter Clark took the long suicide note of the guy who flew his plane into the IRS building in Texas and did a full-blown analysis of the language.

I've never seen this done, and, although it's a critique done at arm's length -- Clark obviously didn't know the pilot, etc. -- it does show that the choices people make when they write can tell significant things about them.

One of the most intriguing, perhaps chilling, things in Clark's analysis is his note that a lot of the writer's phrases are heard every day from politicians and commentators from both sides of the political spectrum. It makes me wonder: Are those people reflecting current thinking in America, and are we living with hundreds of thousands of people who really believe what the pilot believed? Or did the pilot, having listened to that language again and again and again, use it to polish his disenchantment with his perceived enemies?

And lastly: Be sure to read the comments. There is a really interesting discussion going on, reactions to Clark's piece, some people saying Clark never should have written it, and Clark has responded a couple times.

(AP photo)

Isn't it obvious?

I'm going to pick on the AP to make a point. Read this lead:

MISHICOT, Wis.—A Wisconsin woman and her 5-year-old daughter got a fowl visitor when an unwelcome wild turkey crashed through a bedroom window.

Now, I ask you: When would a wild turkey crashing through a bedroom window be welcomed? Can you picture it? "Mom! Mom! A turkey just crashed through the window in my room!" "Oh, Susie, how wonderful! We've been hoping for just such a thing. Hello, turkey, won't you join us for dinner?" Meanwhile, these ingrates in Wisconsin can't seem to accept their good fortune.

It's silly. But we've all done it in our writing/editing. We've written about the tragic accident, as opposed to the joyous one; about a brutal beating, as opposed to a tender one. I wrote a budgetline yesterday that said a guy was busted for illegally selling venison, as opposed to being busted for legally selling it.* Now that would have been noteworthy.

Those needless (and sometimes comical) modifiers can creep in to our writing if we're not vigilant. Be alert for them, and scrub them out of your writing.

*That's also the headline. Alas.

Wig wags thwart the cloaca, and more fun with words

I heard Roy Blount Jr. talking about his book "Alphabet Juice" this morning and it made me remember how much fun it is to have fun with words in stories.

He talked about the word "through," which just goes from the back of your mouth out the front with a little 'hhh' sound trailing out; and about "thwart," which gets caught up in your throat and "thwarts your throughness."

You have to figure he's having fun like that throughout the book. He talks a lot about the way words sound and the physical reasons they sound the way they do; the things words make your mouth do to get them out.

For me, it's a reminder to pay attention to not only how words themselves sound, but how people make them sound when they talk ... and to work to get that sound into our stories. People don't all sound the same. When you write aurally -- when you try to capture what makes your subject distinctive -- and do it successfully, your writing becomes fresh. What a treat for your reader.

I thought of some other times I've worked with writers and we got fun or funny or just plain interesting words into the paper.

When I was at the Carroll County Times, a reporter went to the 4H fair and came back with a story about poultry judges. She described how they did their work, including figuring out the sex of the bird. "They stick their hand up the bird's, you know, rear end ..."

"Cloaca!" I said. (Yep, the bird nerd in me coming out).

"The what?"

"Cloaca. You gotta use that word."

And she did.

A few years ago, Michelle Starr was reporting a significant enterprise piece about train-vs.-car accidents. She came across the descriptions of the types of warnings at intersections of train tracks and roads. One of them was "wig wags and bells." When I heard that, I went nuts. I told Michelle we had to get that in the story somehow; in fact, she could not write a story about train/car accidents without using "bells and wig wags." It was just too good.

As I recall, Michelle looked at me like I'd lost some brain function. And I'm thinking that my excitement made her wonder whether it was really that important to get that phrase in.

Well, it wasn't that important. But my point is: How could you resist? It's too fun, and it fit with the story she was telling.

And it made it into the story.

Anyone else have a good story about a funny word or phrase they worked into a story?