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How can you "select"? One way is to get a mentor/guide/teacher. I believe it was Stephen King in "On Writing" who described one important lesson (adjectives ar

by qznc 9y ago

How can you "select"? One way is to get a mentor/guide/teacher. I believe it was Stephen King in "On Writing" who described one important lesson (adjectives are often superfluous) with a story: As a student he got a job as sport reporter. When he submitted his first draft, the editor immediately sat down and revised it. King noticed how he strikes lots of adjectives, understood that they were superfluous and was enlightened. Personally, I also experienced this. Lessons stick best if someone else corrects your text. Another way is learn it by yourself. This way of learning is harder, but finding a good teacher is not easy either. How? I believe the first step should be learning to notice mistakes. One idea would be to keep the rules in mind and read bad writing (most fan fiction for example). It should be easy to spot violations and this spotting should become a habit. The second step is fix mistakes. Just fix the bad writing. Now repeat. Use good writing and fix mistakes there. If this becomes a habit, it kind of spoils you. You will see mistakes everywhere. As a programmer you know this feeling: Everybody's code looks ugly. The advantage is that you notice the mistakes in your own writing as well. This is the "selection" skill, which allows you to learn on your own. Still, having somebody else is much easier. There are online communities for peer reviews. That is kind of a hybrid. The problem is: How good is your reviewer? If your reviewer is a great writer, why does he hang out in that community?

dredmorbius 9y ago
Good points that finding a suitable selection mechanisms is necessary. If you're looking at writing, having some audience that will provide honest and constructive (no matter how painful) feedback is vital. Keeping in mind that success for any one piece is itself a fairly random occurrence, simply putting content out for public consumption helps. If you're writing for a specific technical purpose, finding those who may be qualified to assess it helps. (This is where a programming or engineering background is somewhat useful, in that compilers and execution, test rigs, etc., are themselves assessments of an attempt, and if you're used to working in this mode, the sane response is "OK, what did I do wrong now and how might I improve this?") Not all tutors, trainers, and/or coaches are helpful. In many cases, they're simply addressing their own need for income while delivering a minimum of value. Most particularly, beware the tutor who fears you outgrowing them -- if they're not sharing with you information you can use to develop and progress on your own, then they're probably not worth retaining. (I'm thinking here of a rather pathological case of "personal trainer" and similar types who provide drills or exercises but don't track relevant measurable progress or explain theory. There's a market for this service, but it is not those who truly wish to excel.) Friends and family are often a poor test if they're concerned with hurting your feelings. I've sought out people I know to be at or near the top of fields of particular interests and written them, infrequently, with respect for their time limits, and if at all possible with specific questions on whether an idea has already been explored and if so where. I bat about 50% on getting replies, but have gained some useful hints -- sometimes encouragement, sometimes criticisms. Finding good discussions also helps. (Much of my own technical and programming development can be directly attributed to Usenet and mailing lists. These days Stack Exchange and a few technical Reddit fora might be added.) For writing: find good writers and find out how they work. One of my obsessions of the past few years has been index cards. And part of that process has involved finding out who has used index cards, and how they've done so. Starting with Carllus Linneaus. John McPhee though is my God in this regard. qznc: a good list of suggestions yourself, I'm just adding a few of my own, and generalising beyond writing.

by qznc 9y ago

dredmorbius 9y ago

Good points that finding a suitable selection mechanisms is necessary. If you're looking at writing, having some audience that will provide honest and constructive (no matter how painful) feedback is vital. Keeping in mind that success for any one piece is itself a fairly random occurrence, simply putting content out for public consumption helps. If you're writing for a specific technical purpose, finding those who may be qualified to assess it helps. (This is where a programming or engineering background is somewhat useful, in that compilers and execution, test rigs, etc., are themselves assessments of an attempt, and if you're used to working in this mode, the sane response is "OK, what did I do wrong now and how might I improve this?") Not all tutors, trainers, and/or coaches are helpful. In many cases, they're simply addressing their own need for income while delivering a minimum of value. Most particularly, beware the tutor who fears you outgrowing them -- if they're not sharing with you information you can use to develop and progress on your own, then they're probably not worth retaining. (I'm thinking here of a rather pathological case of "personal trainer" and similar types who provide drills or exercises but don't track relevant measurable progress or explain theory. There's a market for this service, but it is not those who truly wish to excel.) Friends and family are often a poor test if they're concerned with hurting your feelings. I've sought out people I know to be at or near the top of fields of particular interests and written them, infrequently, with respect for their time limits, and if at all possible with specific questions on whether an idea has already been explored and if so where. I bat about 50% on getting replies, but have gained some useful hints -- sometimes encouragement, sometimes criticisms. Finding good discussions also helps. (Much of my own technical and programming development can be directly attributed to Usenet and mailing lists. These days Stack Exchange and a few technical Reddit fora might be added.) For writing: find good writers and find out how they work. One of my obsessions of the past few years has been index cards. And part of that process has involved finding out who has used index cards, and how they've done so. Starting with Carllus Linneaus. John McPhee though is my God in this regard. qznc: a good list of suggestions yourself, I'm just adding a few of my own, and generalising beyond writing.