6 ms·

A really good book on improving your (nonfiction) writing is Zinsser's On Writing Well. For me the hardest part of effective writing is revision. There are the

A really good book on improving your (nonfiction) writing is Zinsser's On Writing Well. For me the hardest part of effective writing is revision. There are the few lucky writers who get things right in the first draft. Then there are the rest of us, who need to spend 10x the time or longer on rewriting and fussing. Unfortunately many people in the latter group think they fall into the first. In tech essays in particular, you can get far by trying to sound as little like Paul Graham as possible. Let his style be your anti-lodestar.

rosetremiere 4y ago
Can you expand on that last advice?
- idlewords 4y ago
  You know how when you hear a Dave Matthews song, you know instantly that it's him, and also that you're not going to hear anything interesting? Don't write like that. If you start noticing you have a style, cut those bits out.
sillysaurusx 4y ago
It’s hard to argue that pg isn’t one of the most influential tech writers of all time. YC’s original batches came largely from people who read his essays and joined YC. I’d agree with you that his writing doesn’t have much personality; it’s designed not to have any. But you’re saying that you can get “quite far” by going in the other direction. By what metric? You can go quite far by jumping off a cliff, at least till you hit the ground.
- idlewords 4y ago
  Kenny G is the best-selling instrumental artist of all time, but a serious saxophone player would do well not to sound like him. By that metric.
  - sillysaurusx 4y ago
    I figured your criticism was just a “look at me, I hate pg” with no substance, but it’s always disappointing to see it confirmed. Having substance would require having reasons, which always seem to be in short supply whenever people argue against pg’s style. I’m not personally a fan of smooth jazz, but at least Kenny G is well-known. That’s a pretty good metric to aim for when writing, isn’t it?
    - Veen 4y ago
      Idlewords is a better model of good writing than Paul Graham. Maciej might be bloody annoying at times, but I find his writing far more interesting than Graham's, both in its topics and its style.
    - klodolph 4y ago
      Kenny G and smooth jazz get a lot of hate, and most of it is from people who are hating on Kenny G as a kind of “etiquette” to mark that they’re in the right social group—same kind of thing you do by talking about your Prius or whatever other annoying thing people do to put themselves in the right group. Smooth jazz and related genres like adult contemporary are easy targets here (maybe we can pick on Phil Collins next). People love to talk about how much they hate these genres. And then there’s all the people who say they listen to “everything but country and rap”, which is at this point a cliché. It’s all just to show that you’re in the right social group, and less about whether you (personally) took a chance and listened to smooth jazz, then decided what your personal feelings are about it. We’re social creatures and it takes a ton of effort to give music, culture, or people a chance without trying to evaluate our choices through the lens of what is acceptable for our social in-group or the social in-group we aspire to. Most people who “listen to everything” are just saying that because it’s the kind of sentiment that their social in-group values, and if you dig into the actual listening habits “listens to everything” you won’t find anything surprising or unusual.
      - tptacek 4y ago
        You all know that by having an extended discussion of how underrated Kenny G is, you're proving some kind of point about the reverence people here have for Paul Graham's writing, right? I don't know precisely what point it is, but it's unlikely to be one that Paul Graham himself would be thrilled about. Graham certainly does not see himself as the Kenny G of technical and business essayists.
- TremendousJudge 4y ago
  >his writing doesn’t have much personality; it’s designed not to have any I completely disagree. It's possible to be so used to it that you don't notice it. To me his style has very clear voice, one that speaks in a very calm, self-assured manner, always mixing fact and opinion. Yes, it's not quirky like mango.pdf.zone or dry like a research paper, but it still has a very recognizable personality.
AlexCoventry 4y ago
If you've published any writing advice, I'd be interested to take a look at it.
- idlewords 4y ago
  Thank you, but I feel completely unqualified to give it. The Zinsser book I mention above really taught me a lot, even though I approached it with deep skepticism. Maybe you'll find it rewarding too.
  - tptacek 4y ago
    Horse shit. That excuse works for me but does not get you off the hook. (I liked Style: Towards Clarity & Grace a lot; it's like "Effective C Programming" but for writing, and is a Richard Gabriel recommendation. But, uh, you can see what it did for my writing.)
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - AlexCoventry 4y ago
    Thanks. I like On Writing Well, too.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

rosetremiere 4y ago

Can you expand on that last advice?

idlewords 4y ago
You know how when you hear a Dave Matthews song, you know instantly that it's him, and also that you're not going to hear anything interesting? Don't write like that. If you start noticing you have a style, cut those bits out.

sillysaurusx 4y ago

It’s hard to argue that pg isn’t one of the most influential tech writers of all time. YC’s original batches came largely from people who read his essays and joined YC. I’d agree with you that his writing doesn’t have much personality; it’s designed not to have any. But you’re saying that you can get “quite far” by going in the other direction. By what metric? You can go quite far by jumping off a cliff, at least till you hit the ground.

idlewords 4y ago
Kenny G is the best-selling instrumental artist of all time, but a serious saxophone player would do well not to sound like him. By that metric.
- sillysaurusx 4y ago
  I figured your criticism was just a “look at me, I hate pg” with no substance, but it’s always disappointing to see it confirmed. Having substance would require having reasons, which always seem to be in short supply whenever people argue against pg’s style. I’m not personally a fan of smooth jazz, but at least Kenny G is well-known. That’s a pretty good metric to aim for when writing, isn’t it?
  - Veen 4y ago
    Idlewords is a better model of good writing than Paul Graham. Maciej might be bloody annoying at times, but I find his writing far more interesting than Graham's, both in its topics and its style.
  - klodolph 4y ago
    Kenny G and smooth jazz get a lot of hate, and most of it is from people who are hating on Kenny G as a kind of “etiquette” to mark that they’re in the right social group—same kind of thing you do by talking about your Prius or whatever other annoying thing people do to put themselves in the right group. Smooth jazz and related genres like adult contemporary are easy targets here (maybe we can pick on Phil Collins next). People love to talk about how much they hate these genres. And then there’s all the people who say they listen to “everything but country and rap”, which is at this point a cliché. It’s all just to show that you’re in the right social group, and less about whether you (personally) took a chance and listened to smooth jazz, then decided what your personal feelings are about it. We’re social creatures and it takes a ton of effort to give music, culture, or people a chance without trying to evaluate our choices through the lens of what is acceptable for our social in-group or the social in-group we aspire to. Most people who “listen to everything” are just saying that because it’s the kind of sentiment that their social in-group values, and if you dig into the actual listening habits “listens to everything” you won’t find anything surprising or unusual.
    - tptacek 4y ago
      You all know that by having an extended discussion of how underrated Kenny G is, you're proving some kind of point about the reverence people here have for Paul Graham's writing, right? I don't know precisely what point it is, but it's unlikely to be one that Paul Graham himself would be thrilled about. Graham certainly does not see himself as the Kenny G of technical and business essayists.
TremendousJudge 4y ago
>his writing doesn’t have much personality; it’s designed not to have any I completely disagree. It's possible to be so used to it that you don't notice it. To me his style has very clear voice, one that speaks in a very calm, self-assured manner, always mixing fact and opinion. Yes, it's not quirky like mango.pdf.zone or dry like a research paper, but it still has a very recognizable personality.

AlexCoventry 4y ago

If you've published any writing advice, I'd be interested to take a look at it.

idlewords 4y ago
Thank you, but I feel completely unqualified to give it. The Zinsser book I mention above really taught me a lot, even though I approached it with deep skepticism. Maybe you'll find it rewarding too.
- tptacek 4y ago
  Horse shit. That excuse works for me but does not get you off the hook. (I liked Style: Towards Clarity & Grace a lot; it's like "Effective C Programming" but for writing, and is a Richard Gabriel recommendation. But, uh, you can see what it did for my writing.)
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- AlexCoventry 4y ago
  Thanks. I like On Writing Well, too.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]