Writing short pieces more difficult but there’s a technique that works

Writing a short article is much harder than writing a long one. This is a well-known fact. That is why it was no surprise to me that after the Nation advertised in January 2018 for columnists, an overwhelming number of the applicants sent sample article in excess of 650 words, the limit specified in the advertisement.

 The applicants, I knew instinctively, were not defying the advertiser; they just could not help themselves.

One of them offered, creatively, this excuse: “The articles I’ve attached are longer than your required maximum of 650 words since I already submitted them for publishing and hence didn’t want to distort them that much. Hope that this is not a sin too big not to be forgiven.”

 And many would-be contributors to the Nation opinion pages, I can tell from those who — wrongly — send their articles to me instead of the Opinion Editor through the official Opinion Desk address displayed in the newspaper section, continue to send articles that are twice or three times longer than what the Nation publishes.

I reckon, they, too, can’t bring themselves to kill their little darlings in the form of words they’ve written and fallen in love with but which don’t advance their central messages.

Writing briefly

Seasoned writers, including the ancients, have always known that it’s more difficult to write a short article than a long one. The article could be an opinion article, a speech, a letter, or an academic paper.

Writing before Christ was born, Roman philosopher Cicero said: “Writing briefly takes far more time than writing at length.”

Writing some 300 years ago, French mathematician Blaise Pascal said: “I’ve only made this letter longer because I have not had the time to make it shorter...

“Not that the story need be long, but it will take a long while to make it short.”

Seasoned writers have found a technique to deal with this problem. Bret Stephens, an op-ed columnist with The New York Times, says if you want to write a successful 700-word opinion piece, start with a longer draft, then cut and cut again (“Tips for Aspiring Op-Ed Writers,” The New York Times, Aug. 25, 2017).

The desired number of words of the op-ed, it follows, could be 600, 500 and so on.

This “cut-and-cut again” technique is known as the “Reverend Maclean”, named after a Presbyterian minister, John Maclean, who taught his son, Norman, how to write.

Killing little darlings

The technique was popularised in a 1992 movie, A River Runs Through It, based on a book of the same title.

At the beginning of the story, set in early 20th-Century Montana, the United States, Norman explains he and his brother were schooled by their father. He taught nothing but reading and writing and “being a Scot, he believed that the art of writing lay in thrift”.

The scene shows Reverend Maclean, who had a literary bent, working on his Sunday sermon in a room where Norman is writing an essay. Norman then hands over his work. The clergyman looks at it and nods approvingly. “Half as long,” he says.

Norman returns with his halved essay. Glancing at it, the reverend says: “Again, half as long.” When Norman hands over the third version, Reverend Maclean says: “Good. Now throw it away.”

This episode is a powerful teaching moment for would-be contributors to the Nation opinion pages. It advocates mercilessly killing little darlings, pruning and trimming the first draft, to reduce a long article into a short, readable and punchy one.

Truly, American actress Louise Brooks and author of Lulu in Hollywood rightly said: “Writing is one per cent inspiration, and 99 per cent elimination.”

The Public Editor is an independent news ombudsman who handles readers’ complaints on editorial matters including accuracy and journalistic standards. Email: [email protected]. Call or text 0721989264.