The Elusive Perfect Comment - the one that support your article, highlight your talent and bring the reflection further. I would like that it comes to my mind the second I read your article, but I have to think about it. Rewrite it several times. And in the end, it is never as good as I wish it was.
Hey, I think this is helpful. It does, as you say, take some time to say something interesting…and the interestingness, as you put it, really does come from what we do with the original idea (which, of course, is not going to be ours initially)…how we write, how we turn it from something that was not ours into something that is a little bit more original to us by what we say about it.
I really, really would rather have something a bit sprawly, but original, personal, and interesting than something neat, short, and clever-clever.
I think triteness is a good way to describe a peril of trying to write short things and/or trying to write over a short amount of time. The less you write, the more you're likely to rely on clichés and other canned stuff. It works for Twitter because when you have millions of people saying millions of things, plus a mechanism to identify the best content, only a tiny fraction of it needs to be non-trite for Twitter as a whole to be interesting.
Might I recommend reading through some of Aesop's fables for inspiration? Or some parables from the New Testament? Anything that was initially passed along via word of mouth tends to excel at the three paragraph format, by necessity.
As for basic tips: Borrow things from the audience's mind, instead of writing it out yourself. Then recontextualize in a way that's unique enough to stick. Make it a narrative- start familiar/broad, end weird/specific. That way, when people think about the familiar stuff, it naturally leads into the neat thing you wanted to reveal. I'm not sure if that really gels with your preferred style, but hey, maybe you'll get something out of it anyway.
I agree that cultural selection over a few thousands years is a great method to get stories that are both brief and insightful. Sadly I do not have the luxury of waiting a few thousand years every week :p
In all seriousness, studying texts in the genre could help, but only in a limited way, I suspect; reproducing the style of something you read tends to be pretty difficult. Ultimately I think I'm basically close to the limit of what I can do with what time I give myself (although I'll get better with practice, of course). And I'm not sure I actually want to write shorter things; it's more that it *seems* a way to save on time, but I try to recognize that that's an illusion.
Your tips are appreciated! I try to do most of this, but of course it's not always obvious how to do it.
Also, the winner of the acx book review contest - by readers vote - was the longest ever. At 20k words. Which qualifies as novel-length. Keep it coming! Bon chance!
Indeed! And I won 3rd place with a 9000-word essay, too. Each year there are people who complain that there should be a word limit, and each year some of the longest submissions win, it's pretty funny.
The Elusive Perfect Comment - the one that support your article, highlight your talent and bring the reflection further. I would like that it comes to my mind the second I read your article, but I have to think about it. Rewrite it several times. And in the end, it is never as good as I wish it was.
Hey, I think this is helpful. It does, as you say, take some time to say something interesting…and the interestingness, as you put it, really does come from what we do with the original idea (which, of course, is not going to be ours initially)…how we write, how we turn it from something that was not ours into something that is a little bit more original to us by what we say about it.
I really, really would rather have something a bit sprawly, but original, personal, and interesting than something neat, short, and clever-clever.
I dunno. Most of what I see on Twitter is incredibly trite. Just avoiding being trite can get you a long way!
I think triteness is a good way to describe a peril of trying to write short things and/or trying to write over a short amount of time. The less you write, the more you're likely to rely on clichés and other canned stuff. It works for Twitter because when you have millions of people saying millions of things, plus a mechanism to identify the best content, only a tiny fraction of it needs to be non-trite for Twitter as a whole to be interesting.
Fair enough, just thought I'd chime in. If short stuff isn't your bag, no need to force it. Better to write what feels right, in the long run.
Might I recommend reading through some of Aesop's fables for inspiration? Or some parables from the New Testament? Anything that was initially passed along via word of mouth tends to excel at the three paragraph format, by necessity.
As for basic tips: Borrow things from the audience's mind, instead of writing it out yourself. Then recontextualize in a way that's unique enough to stick. Make it a narrative- start familiar/broad, end weird/specific. That way, when people think about the familiar stuff, it naturally leads into the neat thing you wanted to reveal. I'm not sure if that really gels with your preferred style, but hey, maybe you'll get something out of it anyway.
I agree that cultural selection over a few thousands years is a great method to get stories that are both brief and insightful. Sadly I do not have the luxury of waiting a few thousand years every week :p
In all seriousness, studying texts in the genre could help, but only in a limited way, I suspect; reproducing the style of something you read tends to be pretty difficult. Ultimately I think I'm basically close to the limit of what I can do with what time I give myself (although I'll get better with practice, of course). And I'm not sure I actually want to write shorter things; it's more that it *seems* a way to save on time, but I try to recognize that that's an illusion.
Your tips are appreciated! I try to do most of this, but of course it's not always obvious how to do it.
In between those longer posts of yours, this certainly works for me.
Sometimes it's nice to be immersed in the detail. But this still does the job. It's just a nimbler vehicle carrying less.
Three paragraphs can still set the scene, introduce something, then pay it off. It's all about having the reader feel something.
If one can do it, it's really nice! But I legit find it really hard to write briefly
Also, the winner of the acx book review contest - by readers vote - was the longest ever. At 20k words. Which qualifies as novel-length. Keep it coming! Bon chance!
Indeed! And I won 3rd place with a 9000-word essay, too. Each year there are people who complain that there should be a word limit, and each year some of the longest submissions win, it's pretty funny.