Writing Craft Archives - Page 2 of 7

To apostrophise or not to apostrophise?

Most of the time, deciding whether to use a possessive apostrophe is pretty easy If the concept demonstrates some possession (ie, you can turn it around and include ‘of’ or ‘belonging to’), then a possessive apostrophe is needed Boys’ books The books belonging to the boys Easy But I often get asked how to decide whether something is an adjective that doesn’t need the possessive That decision isn’t always as clear And it can be particularly tricky if the word in question is a...

In sentences: put together ideas that belong together

Sentences with awkward or confusing structure – particularly sentences that separate ideas that should be kept together – create all sorts of problems for readers Sometimes they lead to misunderstandings that can undermine the purpose of their document Sometimes they cause the reader to trip – which slows reading, creates momentary confusion, and draws attention to the writing rather than its content Sometimes, they’re simply good for a giggle Here’s an example of an awkward...

Long live the singular they

I’m currently enjoying Steven Pinker’s excellent 2014 book ‘The sense of style: The thinking person’s guide to writing in the 21st century’ But there’s something about Pinker’s writing style that’s a great irritation to my Australian sense of style In each chapter, Pinker alternates the gender of his imagined readers and writers Early in the book, Pinker provides this explanation: ‘To avoid the awkwardness of strings of he or she, I have borrowed a convention from...

Why writing is like cooking

I love a good metaphor And in my new life as café-owning writer, I can’t help but see the metaphorical parallels between writing and cooking As a writer, I’m confident in my ability to turn out (reasonably) good copy, on time, every time My confidence comes from my understanding of my writing processes I know how I work and I have a set of techniques that I can apply to any writing task Because I understand the way I work, I know how to begin, how to work through each stage, and how to...

Making sense of sentences in election materials

Election materials are starting to appear in our letterboxes, and they feature some ill-conceived sentences Here’s a sentence/caption from the front of a recent ALP brochure: Virginia O’Neill teaching her son, Labor Candidate for Brisbane, Pat O’Neill and his sister to read in 1985 This sentence has two problems – one to do with sets of information, and one to do with Virginia’s relationship to Pat Sets of information: ‘Labor Candidate for Brisbane’ is a subset/description of...

Apostrophes for mothers’ day

I’ve always had a bit of a thing for possessive apostrophes – much abused and misunderstood as they are And it’s this time of the year that I’m most aware of the little mark … because the day for mothers is upon us Every year I’m bothered by the various ways that marketers write about the day As you choose your card, do you wish your mother: Happy Mothers Day, Happy Mother’s Day, or Happy Mothers’ Day In my household, I insist on Happy Mothers’ Day, even though the...

Ageing driver training facility

A note on why we need punctuation and why stacked adjectives create difficulties: I was listening to the radio news today, and heard a story about an ageing driver training facility in Mt Cotton Radio can't handle this concept neatly Is it an ageing-driver training facility or an ageing, driver-training facility The latter is correct (though the former was my first guess) A radio journalist might be better to unstack the adjectives or choose different words: 'an ageing facility for driver...

Prison or jail? Being consistent with names

One of the things I often discuss in writing training is the need to be consistent with naming Whatever name you choose for something at the beginning of the document should be used consistently throughout, so that readers can be sure you’re referring to the same thing If you’re writing about a review, for example, it’s called ‘a review’ throughout the document; you don’t start referring to it as ‘an evaluation’, ‘a plan’ or ‘a process’ Here’s an example I heard on...

Sentences need to make internal sense

Writing sentences that make internal sense - with content that connects across a sentence's various parts - is an easily missed editing task Here's a sentence written by my son's school this week:'If successful in the preliminary round, the state final will be held at Griffith University on Saturday 14 November'The problem in this sentence relates to content agreement: it's about two different things And while I understand what the author means, I have to work to get there What they've...