Improving your writing through editing
Copyright © 2000 James Boyk

(References to EE/Mu 107 mean James Boyk's course at Caltech, "Projects in Music & Science.")

 

THE PROCESS of writing is a combination of two quite different activities. One consists of "getting it down on paper"; the other, of editing it once it's on the paper. Casual writing --- a postcard to a friend --- may consist only of the first activity. But if you cross out a word on the postcard and replace it with another, there's your "editing."
    In the first activity, you transfer your perceptions, thoughts or feelings from your brain to the page, forming them into words as you do so. It's a virtue to enhance the flow by not being judgmental as you write.
    In editing, by contrast, you must be judgmental. The virtue is to take pleasure in removing what you've labored to get down on paper, and in finding how succinct you can make the final version.
    Additional virtues in both activities are unbounded energy; in fiction, respect for your characters; and, in all writing, remembering that writing is a performance. To the reader, the words and thoughts are events in a time sequence. The reader may be barely following you; clinging to your line of thought like a silent-movie comic to an 8th-story window ledge. Everything the reader can't follow weakens his or her grip on the ledge. Two or three illogical sequences--perhaps even one--and the reader falls. Then it's too late for remedies.

Inexperienced writers sometimes imagine that writing consists only of the first activity--getting things onto paper--but both activities are crucial; and usually, both are in play at once. However, we can separate them conceptually.
    This essay deals only with the second activity: how to edit what you've written. I will introduce you to a simple technique that allows you, on your own, to be confident that you are improving what you've written. The technique is so very simple that it's tempting to think it must be meaningless; but decades of experience prove that it is powerful, though one does need a bit of experience with it to appreciate its power. Every so often I hear from an EE/Mu 107 student of long ago, who writes to say that this technique has helped in her work, or even gotten her a raise.
    The idea underlying the technique is that succinct writing is good writing, and the more succinct the better -- if the writing accomplishes what you want it to.

The technique is as follows:
    1. Set margins so that your writing falls into a column 40 to 45 characters wide. (It's convenient to use a non-proportional font for this.)
    2. Edit to minimize the number of lines. (NB: Not the number of words.)
Here's a paragraph from the introduction above, formated according to rule no. 1.

Original (15 lines):

This essay deals only with the second
activity: how to edit what you've written.
I will introduce you to a simple technique
that allows you, on your own, to be
confident that you are improving what
you've written. The technique is so very
simple that it's tempting to think it must
be meaningless; but decades of experience
prove that it is powerful, though one does
need a bit of experience with it to
appreciate its power. Every so often I hear
from an EE/Mu 107 student of long ago, who
writes to say that this technique has
helped in her work, or even gotten her a
raise.

How will we reduce the number of lines? A glance at the end of the paragraph--an experienced editor always looks first at paragraph ends--shows a one-word line. If we eliminate this word, or anything of similar length, the 15 lines will decrease to 14.
    At this point, I must tell you that there's a big disadvantage to explaining this technique via an essay rather than face-to-face. What you choose to eliminate will be individual to you, and part of the fun is to compare our different ideas. For now, I'll have to take my own suggestions. There are many possibilities, even though I didn't intentionally write the paragraph slackly. One possibility is to remove the words in brackets in the following: "This essay deals only with [the second activity:] how to edit what you've written...." This gives--

Intermediate Result 1 (14 lines):

This essay deals only with how to edit
what you've written. I will introduce you
to a simple technique that allows you, on
your own, to be confident that you are
improving what you've written. The
technique is so very simple that it's
tempting to think it must be meaningless;
but decades of experience prove that it is
powerful, though one does need a bit of
experience with it to appreciate its
power. Every so often I hear from an EE/Mu
107 student of long ago, who writes to say
that this technique has helped in her
work, or even gotten her a raise.

What are other possibilities? You might feel that "on your own" could be eliminated. To me, however, this phrase conveys the idea that the technique frees students from needing me or anyone else nearby to confirm that their changes are indeed improvements. You may agree about this or not; the important thing is to notice that when we discuss it, we are discussing the substance and tone of the paragraph, not some piddly pedantic point. This is one of the big virtues of this editing technique. It doesn't care what you eliminate. It makes no value judgment. If you feel a particular point is important, keep it; but then eliminate something else.
    Isn't there a limit, a point beyond which a paragraph, or a whole essay, can't be shortened any more? There must be; but it's hard to find a "hard limit" because editing gets harder and harder as you shorten more and more. Hence the remark quoted above, about not having time "to write it shorter." I'm an experienced writer; and if I write something as tightly as I can in ordinary format, and then put it into the narrow-column format, I can "lose" an additional 10-20% of the lines. When I first wrote for publication, I re-drafted an article 10 times, making it as tight as I could. Then I submitted it to the editor; and he returned it with alterations which did not touch the core of what I'd written but made it 30% shorter! Until you are experienced, it's best to assume that you can cut 50% of the length of anything you write. For an example of ultra-short essays written as tightly as I know how, see http://www.cco.caltech.edu/~boyk/piano.htm.
    By the way, it's trivial to write something short. What I'm talking about is a piece of writing that says all it needs to say, with an appropriate tone, bearing its likely reader(s) in mind, and is also as succinct as possible.
    Continuing with our editing, let's say we keep the phrase "on your own." Then we're back at Intermediate Result 1, which I'll repeat here for convenience, at the same time marking more possibilities for elimination.

Intermediate Result 1 (repeated, with further editing possibilities in brackets):

This essay deals only with how to edit
what you've written. I will introduce you
to a [simple] technique that allows you, on
your own, to be confident that you are
improving what you've written. The
technique is so [very] simple that it's
tempting to think it must be meaningless;
but [decades of] experience prove that it is
powerful, though one does need [a bit of]
experience [with it] to appreciate its
power. Every so often I hear from [an EE/Mu
107 student of long ago], who writes to say
that this technique has helped in her
work, or even gotten her a raise.

   "Simple": You may feel that the word should be kept, as it reassures the reader. That would be my choice.
   "Very": No problem to eliminating this.
   "Decades of": Do we keep this phrase because it gives more weight to the author's (that is, my) judgment that the editing technique is valuable? Or eliminate it because it makes the author seem to be "pulling rank" on the reader? Your decision will depend on your reaction. (If you pull it, then the word "prove" must become "proves.") Personally, I would eliminate it.
   "A bit of"... "with it": I would eliminate both of these.
   "An EE/Mu 107 student of long ago": Why not just say "a former student"?
   Regarding "her": I find "him or her" awkward, and I hate to use "their"; so I tend to alternate "him" and "her" in writing.

With these changes, we get the following:

Intermediate Result 2 (13 lines):

This essay deals only with how to edit
what you've written. I will introduce you
to a simple technique that allows you, on
your own, to be confident that you are
improving what you've written. The
technique is so simple that it's tempting
to think it must be meaningless; but
experience proves that it is powerful,
though one does need experience to
appreciate its power. Every so often I
hear from a former student who writes to
say that this technique has helped in her
work, or even gotten her a raise.

By a similar process, I arrive at ---

Intermediate Result 3 (12 lines):

This essay deals only with how to edit. I
will introduce a technique that allows you
to be confident that you are improving
what you've written. The technique is so
simple that it's tempting to think it
can't be useful; but experience proves
that it is powerful, though one does need
experience to appreciate its power. Every
so often I hear from a former student who
writes to say that this technique has
helped in her work, or even gotten her a
raise.

I eliminated "simple" this time because I decided that actually making the explanation as simple as possible would reassure the reader more than an assertion that the technique was simple. I changed "must be useless" to "can't be useful" as the latter seemed stronger. As I now read the paragraph aloud, though, I wonder what point is served by the part that says: "The technique is so simple that it's tempting to think it can't be useful; but experience proves that it is powerful, though one does need experience to appreciate its power." This leads to--

Intermediate Result 4 (7 lines):

This essay deals only with how to edit. I
will introduce a technique that allows you
to be confident that you are improving
what you've written. Every so often, a
former student writes to say that this
technique has helped in her work, or even
gotten her a raise.

By this point, the "editing glee" is in full flower. I give a moment to thinking about whether the paragraph is necessary at all. This should always be one's first question, but it slipped my mind, probably because I assumed that anything I wrote must be worth reading. I decide that the paragraph does have content, though not so much as I thought. I notice more possibilities for shortening.

Intermediate Result 5 (7 lines):

This essay deals only with editing. I
describe a technique that allows you to be
confident that you are improving what
you've written. Former students sometimes
write to say that this technique has
helped in their work, or even gotten them
raises.

Notice that the "his/her" problem is gone. Again we have a one-word last line. Can't let that stay.

Intermediate Result 6 (6 lines):

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say that this
technique has helped in their work, or
even gotten them raises.

Changes in the casting of the sentences have allowed further shortening. I'm a little uncomfortable with the part around the word "describing," though. Can I find another way to say it?

Intermediate Result 7 (6 lines):

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
and I describe a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say that this
technique has helped in their work, or
even gotten them raises.

This seems better to me. Or does it? It's a little "clunkier," and has one more use of "I"--these are negatives --but... but are there any positives? I go back and forth in my mind. Maybe no positives. OK, I'll go back to result 6:

Final Result = Intermediate Result 6 (6 lines):

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say that this
technique has helped in their work, or
even gotten them raises.

For comparison, here's the original. To put the comparison in context, read the opening of the essay, at the top of this page.

Original (15 lines):

This essay deals only with the second
activity: how to edit what you've written.
I will introduce you to a simple technique
that allows you, on your own, to be
confident that you are improving what
you've written. The technique is so very
simple that it's tempting to think it must
be meaningless; but decades of experience
prove that it is powerful, though one does
need a bit of experience with it to
appreciate its power. Every so often I hear
from an EE/Mu 107 student of long ago, who
writes to say that this technique has
helped in her work, or even gotten her a
raise.

Having written for editors from many publications, I have found that to some degree the versions of different professionals will converge. But there will always be individual variations to convey the individuality of the writer/editor; and of course the writing of the original itself will be profoundly different from one writer to another. Don't fear that your individuality will be submerged by this process. I would say rather the opposite: it will be focused and enhanced.

The Next Day

After an overnight break, I look at the 15-line original and the 6-line final result. I wonder if I went overboard in eliminating the part saying, "The technique is so very simple that it's tempting to think it must be meaningless; but decades of experience prove that it is powerful, though one does need a bit of experience with it to appreciate its power." One thing I've learned from years of teaching this technique is that people often underestimate its power, and that a few words as antidote can be useful. I'll try putting those lines back, but I'll put them at the end of the paragraph instead of in the middle. That will lead more smoothly into the following paragraph, which begins "The idea underlying the technique...." Oh! But wait; didn't I have an edited version of the lines to be re-inserted? Yes; in Intermediate Result 3: "The technique is so simple that it's tempting to think it can't be useful; but experience proves that it is powerful, though one does need experience to appreciate its power."

Intermediate Result 8, with previous cut restored in a different place (10 lines)

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say that this
technique has helped in their work, or
even gotten them raises. The technique is
so simple that it's tempting to think it
can't be useful; but experience proves that
it is powerful, though one does need
experience to appreciate its power.

With the fresh eyes of a new day, I see a number of problems and possibilities. The phrase about "tempting to think it can't be useful" strikes me, as it has since the beginning, as awkward. Can't I think of a more direct way to say it? How would I convey it to a friend in casual conversation? "The technique's so simple it's hard to believe how powerful it is." Maybe something like that; and then continuing, "...but work with it a while and you'll become a believer." That phrase "a while" seems to imply "a short while." Do I want to imply that the virtues of this technique become obvious quickly? No, because that's not true. It really does take some experience with it to appreciate it fully. Hmmm....
     [Pause for thought]
     Perhaps I can omit the second part of that statement altogether; leave it at, "The technique's so simple it's hard to believe how powerful it is." But no; in my experience it's important to convey to students the idea that they will appreciate it once they have experience with it. Perhaps, "...but with experience you'll come to appreciate it fully." No; this is feeble in both content and rhythm.
     [Another pause for thought.]
     What about "The technique's so simple that it's hard to imagine it can improve your writing; but experience shows that it's truly powerful." OK; I'll go ahead with this.

Intermediate Result 9 (9 lines)

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say that this
technique has helped in their work, or
even gotten them raises. The technique's so
simple that it's hard to imagine it can
improve your writing; but experience shows
that it's truly powerful.

Now to mark some further possibilities:

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say [that] this
technique has helped in their [work], or
even gotten them raises. The technique's so
simple that it's hard to imagine it can
improve your writing; but experience shows
that it's truly powerful.

   "That": Can be eliminated for smoothness.
   "Work": Perhaps "jobs" would make clearer that I mean "employment." "Jobs" would connect better with the following phrase, about getting a raise.
I'll incorporate these two changes and see where that gets me.

Intermediate Result 10 (9 lines)

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say this technique
has helped in their jobs, or even gotten
them raises. The technique's so simple that
it's hard to imagine it can improve your
writing; but experience shows that it's
truly powerful.

The short last line is tempting. Can I reduce the whole thing to 8 lines? I need to save at least 15 letters (the length of the last line). In line 3, I could substitute "you're" for "you are"; that would improve the rhythm but would save only one letter.
     In line 4, I could say, "Past students says the technique's helped...."; but that saves only 3 characters. (You know you're getting close to the "hard limit" on editing when you're thinking about individual characters. The hope is that the accumulation of tiny improvements at the character level may somehow open up new possibilities for the entire paragraph. Sometimes it does; sometimes it just gives you the idea that you should throw out the whole paragraph. Both are valuable.)
     In line 5, I could say, "helped in their jobs--even gotten them raises." That saves another three characters, but I wonder if it doesn't change the style. Never mind; I'll keep going.
     In line 6, the "that" at the end can be eliminated, but a comma will be necessary ("The technique's so simple, it's hard to imagine...."); the saving is 4 characters. So far, I've saved 11 characters. Let's look at it now.

Intermediate Result 11 (9 lines)

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you're improving what you've
written. Past students say the technique's
helped in their jobs--even gotten them
raises. The technique's so simple, it's
hard to imagine it can improve your
writing; but experience shows that it's
truly powerful.

I'm not quite there. Can I do more? I read it out loud, listening closely. I wish I hadn't removed the word "simple" in line 2. I think it would reassure the reader.
     I notice also that the paragraph doesn't say the technique helps you improve what you've written and gives you confidence you're doing so.
     Here's the word "simple," in line 6; perhaps I don't need it earlier.
     And here, in line 7, is the statement that it does help improve your writing.
     It all seems confused to me now; it's hard to pay attention to it. Words and ideas are a blur. (This is a common phenomenon. One help for it is to read out loud, but I'm already doing that. Another is to take a break; anything from a few minutes to overnight. A third is to ask someone else to read it to you.)
     Ah! I see; I should move the last sentence back to the middle of the paragraph. I bet that will offer further opportunities for shortening.

Intermediate Result 12 = Result 11 re-ordered (9 lines)

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you're improving what you've
written. The technique's so simple, it's
hard to imagine it can improve your
writing; but experience shows that it's
truly powerful. Past students say the
technique's helped in their jobs--even
gotten them raises.

Hmmm... This doesn't feel direct to me any more. What if I recast it?

Intermediate Result 13: Recasting (6 lines)

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a deceptively simple technique
that lets you improve your writing and be
confident you're doing so. Former students
say it's helped in their jobs--even gotten
them raises.

The word "deceptively" in line 2 replaces the entire long statement, "The technique's so simple, it's hard to imagine it can improve your writing; but experience shows that it's truly powerful." Eliminating that statement allows room for the phrase, "and be confident you're doing so," which, from my teaching experience, is important. I say "former students" instead of "past students" because it makes the structure of the sentence clearer from the first moment.
     I'm down to 6 lines again, the length of yesterday's "final result," which I'll reproduce here for convenience.

First Day's Final Result (6 lines):

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a technique that gives you
confidence you are improving what you've
written. Past students say that this
technique has helped in their work, or
even gotten them raises.

To me, today's version is smoother and punchier. This is what I'll keep.

2nd Day Final Result = Intermediate Result 13 (6 lines)

In this essay, I deal only with editing,
describing a deceptively simple technique
that lets you improve your writing and be
confident you're doing so. Former students
say it's helped in their jobs--even gotten
them raises.

Comments:
     Six lines in the final version, 15 in the original: a 60% cut in length with no loss of content.
     Most of the discussion has been about the content. The process demands precise thinking about what we're actually trying to say.
     The process looks laborious when written out, but is actually quick when you're experienced. I estimate 10 minutes or less for "day one"; and perhaps five minutes for "day two."
     The exact process described above is authentic: I wrote it down as I was doing it, over a period of two days.
     Remember that editing is just one side of the writing coin.
     Good writing is not easy. "Your easy reading's damned hard writing," as Nathaniel Hawthorne said.
     Your feedback is welcome!

Here is the edited paragraph back in the original format, with preceding and following paragraphs for context.

2nd Day final result in original format and in context

...Inexperienced writers sometimes imagine that writing consists only of the first activity--getting things onto paper--but both activities are crucial; and usually, both are in play at once. However, we can separate them conceptually.
    In this essay, I deal only with editing, describing a deceptively simple technique that lets you improve your writing and be confident you're doing so. Former students say it's helped in their jobs--even gotten them raises.
    The idea underlying the technique is that succinct writing is good writing, and the more succinct the better -- if the writing accomplishes what you want it to....

I hope you agree that this is much better than the original.

-James Boyk