5 ms·

> Writing concise prose is harder than the stream-of-consciousness style... Totally true, but I think that's not what's happening. Yesterday an HN post was mad

> Writing concise prose is harder than the stream-of-consciousness style... Totally true, but I think that's not what's happening. Yesterday an HN post was made about this https://lithub.com/the-wolves-of-stanislav-an-improbably-true-parable-for-the-pandemic-age/ https://lithub.com/the-wolves-of-stanislav-an-improbably-tru... It's carefully written to be like that, it's verbose by design, and I started skimming then closed it. I don't know why these timewaster articles are produced either, but it's not accident or laziness. Plenty irritating though.

mannykannot 7y ago
Perhaps there's a generation that has seen little else, and takes this to be the best or only way to write? Are we teaching people to write this way, with examinations having a time limit and where, in practice, the score correlates strongly with length? (Though that has been the case for a long time.) Is concise writing taken to be difficult-textbook style, and undesirable anywhere else? Print media editors necessarily have to constrain length, and authors learned to write accordingly. Nowadays, a lot of writing is unconstrained either by physical limits or editors. The specific example you give appears to be intentionally literary in intent, and so conciseness is not necessarily a prime virtue. When authors were paid by the word, prolixity was effectively encouraged, and this is obvious in some of Poe's work.
- apocalypstyx 7y ago
  Conciseness isn't necessarily a technological limitation. During the Victorian Era "triple-decker novels" were the in-thing. Then there's the old aphorism: Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. We want to claim that style obfuscates content. However, simplicity can also be a style that obfuscates content by its nature, just as much as any other, maybe sometimes more than any other. Maybe the problem is we want to implicitly assume that communication styles are simply accretions around the true message which exists in non-physical being, and if we could just 'read minds', everything would be perfect, and as with Gnosticism, the 'Truth' gets weighed down with the sin of physicality (wrapped up in words in this case). So we try to be verbal ascetics, throwing our sentences, rather than our bodies, in the ovens to strip flesh. When in reality the words do not convey like boxcars carrying grain, but are the thing in themselves and solely such. So maybe this ends up back at a kind of radical materialism, a world were nothing is backed by the pure truth of God (or, in this case, 'pure information').
  - mannykannot 7y ago
    > Conciseness isn't necessarily a technological limitation. Of course not, but I doubt that it is entirely coincidental that the article here is from a well-established print journal. > However, simplicity can also be a style that obfuscates content by its nature. Occasionally, in response to an editorial mandate, I have condensed something to the point where even I have difficulty following it after some time has passed. The point here, however, is that this article is both concise and clear. > When in reality the words do not convey like boxcars carrying grain... Indeed; if they did, style would not be an issue, and grammar would not be a thing. >... but are the thing in themselves and solely such. Words in themselves are nothing without an accepted vocabulary.
- rmellow 7y ago
  It's more than expressing a thought with more words than necessary: so many articles start with something along the likes of "it was a sunny May afternoon in the office of Dr. Whoever, where the cobblestones in the entrance glinted the fading sunlight. When Dr. Whoever was a boy, his father would take him out fishing..." ... and rambles on with meaningless details, containing perhaps a handful of passages in the article that are actually relevant to what the title promised me. Perhaps a clearer example is when you find a recipe online. You will find pages of how the recipe has been in the family for ages, and how the author's family is delighted with it, and the innumerous and unproven health benefits it has, and how it's so easy to make, etc. The actual recipe is half a page.
  - ghaff 7y ago
    And generally speaking I appreciate the context for the recipe. It's why people still buy cookbooks these days and subscribe to the (sadly) diminished number of cooking magazines that are really about food and travel. (RIP Gourmet.) If I'm really only looking for a recipe it's really not that hard to spend 10 seconds scrolling down.
  - antasvara 7y ago
    While that style personally annoys me, I feel as though a decent chunk of the American populace find the topic of an article more interesting if they understand the human context behind it. The recipe example is a perfect distillation of that point; while some (or most) people come for just the recipe, there is a subset that are interested in how the recipe came to be. Meanwhile, adding that context doesn't dissuade most people from scrolling to the bottom to get the actual recipe. At the end of the day, most (not all) of the population is either interested in the descriptive language and human aspect of a topic, or is interested enough in the topic to ignore the descriptive language and human interest parts.
  - watwut 7y ago
    I remember reading analysis of this. Basically, it had to do with how google search engine selects content to show. Real receipt is short and similar everywhere, hence it does not show in results. People who earn money from writing receipts online adjusted and add long winded crap so that google gods favor them more.
mellosouls 7y ago
If I've read you correctly, you've dismissed a generally well regarded literary writer as an author of a "timewaster article". You may be correct, but considering the author's long career and standing, you should consider the possibility that the issue here is your personal taste rather than the merits of the writer. https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Auster https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Auster
AnimalMuppet 7y ago
I think that it was more a thing in earlier years. When you had more time than you had stuff to read, long, meandering articles were wonderful. But that is, um, not the condition of most people on HN.
- foldr 7y ago
  If you look at where the article was published, it's unlikely that it was written with HN readers in mind.
foldr 7y ago
You might as well complain that a novel wasted your time because the main plot points could have been summarized in a couple of pages. The article you link to is obviously supposed to be a personal story told with some literary flare, not a concise journalistic report. If you really lack this bare minimum of genre sensitivity then, well, no wonder you think there is a lot of bad writing.
- throwaway_pdp09 7y ago
  @mellosouls, @foldr: of course it's taste, let's agree on that. But I reckon my opinion counts, and sure, the author could have done lots of 'better' (= more readable to me) stuff. But when the articles are about wolves, get to the bloody point please; I'm working, my time is limited. Also sloppy literary self indulgences: "And whether they were there or not, I choose to believe in the wolves" In other contexts such as actual physical survival, reality matters 100% and ignoring it can get you killed.
  - foldr 7y ago
    >Also sloppy literary self indulgences: "And whether they were there or not, I choose to believe in the wolves" I'm baffled by this statement. I really think you must be fundamentally failing to grasp the genre of this particular piece of writing. It's not a lonely planet guide.
    - throwaway_pdp09 7y ago
      OK, let's discuss. My subsequent sentence explained why it mattered; you can't negotiate with reality. qv. covid. You can try but reality always wins. What is the genre here that gives it a pass? If it's fiction anything goes but this is supposed to be historical investigation. Therefore facts matter. Disagree?
      - Nasrudith 7y ago
        Postmodernism is the genre although they would likely be mortally offended by calling it a genre - not only because of their "genre fiction vs literary fiction" snobbery but because postmodernists called themselves a movement. Although if I recall correctly the sollipism really fell out of favor with the George W. Bush administration and that aspect has been in decline since.

mannykannot 7y ago

Perhaps there's a generation that has seen little else, and takes this to be the best or only way to write? Are we teaching people to write this way, with examinations having a time limit and where, in practice, the score correlates strongly with length? (Though that has been the case for a long time.) Is concise writing taken to be difficult-textbook style, and undesirable anywhere else? Print media editors necessarily have to constrain length, and authors learned to write accordingly. Nowadays, a lot of writing is unconstrained either by physical limits or editors. The specific example you give appears to be intentionally literary in intent, and so conciseness is not necessarily a prime virtue. When authors were paid by the word, prolixity was effectively encouraged, and this is obvious in some of Poe's work.

apocalypstyx 7y ago
Conciseness isn't necessarily a technological limitation. During the Victorian Era "triple-decker novels" were the in-thing. Then there's the old aphorism: Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. We want to claim that style obfuscates content. However, simplicity can also be a style that obfuscates content by its nature, just as much as any other, maybe sometimes more than any other. Maybe the problem is we want to implicitly assume that communication styles are simply accretions around the true message which exists in non-physical being, and if we could just 'read minds', everything would be perfect, and as with Gnosticism, the 'Truth' gets weighed down with the sin of physicality (wrapped up in words in this case). So we try to be verbal ascetics, throwing our sentences, rather than our bodies, in the ovens to strip flesh. When in reality the words do not convey like boxcars carrying grain, but are the thing in themselves and solely such. So maybe this ends up back at a kind of radical materialism, a world were nothing is backed by the pure truth of God (or, in this case, 'pure information').
- mannykannot 7y ago
  > Conciseness isn't necessarily a technological limitation. Of course not, but I doubt that it is entirely coincidental that the article here is from a well-established print journal. > However, simplicity can also be a style that obfuscates content by its nature. Occasionally, in response to an editorial mandate, I have condensed something to the point where even I have difficulty following it after some time has passed. The point here, however, is that this article is both concise and clear. > When in reality the words do not convey like boxcars carrying grain... Indeed; if they did, style would not be an issue, and grammar would not be a thing. >... but are the thing in themselves and solely such. Words in themselves are nothing without an accepted vocabulary.
rmellow 7y ago
It's more than expressing a thought with more words than necessary: so many articles start with something along the likes of "it was a sunny May afternoon in the office of Dr. Whoever, where the cobblestones in the entrance glinted the fading sunlight. When Dr. Whoever was a boy, his father would take him out fishing..." ... and rambles on with meaningless details, containing perhaps a handful of passages in the article that are actually relevant to what the title promised me. Perhaps a clearer example is when you find a recipe online. You will find pages of how the recipe has been in the family for ages, and how the author's family is delighted with it, and the innumerous and unproven health benefits it has, and how it's so easy to make, etc. The actual recipe is half a page.
- ghaff 7y ago
  And generally speaking I appreciate the context for the recipe. It's why people still buy cookbooks these days and subscribe to the (sadly) diminished number of cooking magazines that are really about food and travel. (RIP Gourmet.) If I'm really only looking for a recipe it's really not that hard to spend 10 seconds scrolling down.
- antasvara 7y ago
  While that style personally annoys me, I feel as though a decent chunk of the American populace find the topic of an article more interesting if they understand the human context behind it. The recipe example is a perfect distillation of that point; while some (or most) people come for just the recipe, there is a subset that are interested in how the recipe came to be. Meanwhile, adding that context doesn't dissuade most people from scrolling to the bottom to get the actual recipe. At the end of the day, most (not all) of the population is either interested in the descriptive language and human aspect of a topic, or is interested enough in the topic to ignore the descriptive language and human interest parts.
- watwut 7y ago
  I remember reading analysis of this. Basically, it had to do with how google search engine selects content to show. Real receipt is short and similar everywhere, hence it does not show in results. People who earn money from writing receipts online adjusted and add long winded crap so that google gods favor them more.

mellosouls 7y ago

If I've read you correctly, you've dismissed a generally well regarded literary writer as an author of a "timewaster article". You may be correct, but considering the author's long career and standing, you should consider the possibility that the issue here is your personal taste rather than the merits of the writer. https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Auster https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Auster

AnimalMuppet 7y ago

I think that it was more a thing in earlier years. When you had more time than you had stuff to read, long, meandering articles were wonderful. But that is, um, not the condition of most people on HN.

foldr 7y ago
If you look at where the article was published, it's unlikely that it was written with HN readers in mind.

foldr 7y ago

You might as well complain that a novel wasted your time because the main plot points could have been summarized in a couple of pages. The article you link to is obviously supposed to be a personal story told with some literary flare, not a concise journalistic report. If you really lack this bare minimum of genre sensitivity then, well, no wonder you think there is a lot of bad writing.

throwaway_pdp09 7y ago
@mellosouls, @foldr: of course it's taste, let's agree on that. But I reckon my opinion counts, and sure, the author could have done lots of 'better' (= more readable to me) stuff. But when the articles are about wolves, get to the bloody point please; I'm working, my time is limited. Also sloppy literary self indulgences: "And whether they were there or not, I choose to believe in the wolves" In other contexts such as actual physical survival, reality matters 100% and ignoring it can get you killed.
- foldr 7y ago
  >Also sloppy literary self indulgences: "And whether they were there or not, I choose to believe in the wolves" I'm baffled by this statement. I really think you must be fundamentally failing to grasp the genre of this particular piece of writing. It's not a lonely planet guide.
  - throwaway_pdp09 7y ago
    OK, let's discuss. My subsequent sentence explained why it mattered; you can't negotiate with reality. qv. covid. You can try but reality always wins. What is the genre here that gives it a pass? If it's fiction anything goes but this is supposed to be historical investigation. Therefore facts matter. Disagree?
    - Nasrudith 7y ago
      Postmodernism is the genre although they would likely be mortally offended by calling it a genre - not only because of their "genre fiction vs literary fiction" snobbery but because postmodernists called themselves a movement. Although if I recall correctly the sollipism really fell out of favor with the George W. Bush administration and that aspect has been in decline since.