How to write so they want to read?

In principle, writing seems simple. You just need to know the rules of punctuation and spelling. All you need is a keyboard, a computer and some editing software to communicate your thoughts to others. In principle, yes, but...

Table of contents

From the FOX P2 gene to the internet

Some 200,000 years ago, a gene developed in our ancestors that made communication possible. Scientists have named it FOX P2. Studies have shown that it reaches about 30% higher expression in girls. Therefore, the statistical female speaks more than the statistical male. And that’s perfectly fine. But is she more intelligible as a result? That is another question.

The FOX P2 gene is still being improved. For 200,000 years, however, the improvement of communication has gone rather reluctantly. Starting with pictorial writing, which appeared 30,000 BCE, through the invention of writing some 3,300 BCE to the spread of printing by John Gutenberg in the 15th century, little happened in this respect. Then the world, as if it had eaten its pea soup, sped up. It accelerated most rapidly between the 19th and 20th centuries and in every field. Inventions facilitating communication were spreading like wildfire. The telegraph, telephone, radio, television and finally the computer and the internet all happened in the space of a century or so. In this way, the tools to communicate are available to everyone. We are no longer just recipients of messages, but we can transmit them. In theory, what we want to communicate can reach any person in the world. This is a great achievement, but also the bane of our time. Every day we absorb 34 gigabytes of data. That is the equivalent of 100 000 words. In ancient China, convicts had their eyelids cut off. The man could not close his eyes and 24 hours a day received stimuli from the surrounding reality.

If

In ancient Greece, there was a land called Laconia. Its capital was Sparta. We all know the story of how three hundred heroes almost stopped an entire Persian army. On the other hand, few people know that the Spartans perfected the art of communicating in an extremely blunt and economical manner. According to one myth, during a war with Persia, one of its kings sent a threatening letter to Sparta. It read: ‘If we enter Laconia we will leave no stone unturned’. The Spartans replied with one word: ‘If’.

During the writing workshop, I ask those present to write ten sentences on any topic. At the next stage, their task is to shorten the text to three sentences. Finally, participants are asked to write one sentence. This is a simple way to see that what we have to communicate can be done in a very … laconic way. By writing succinctly, succinctly, essence-wise, we leave behind all those who are in love with sentences that bloom like geraniums in spring, with no full stop in sight. A simple example – you can do something:

buy
or
– implement and execute the acquisition through an effective sale and purchase transaction

Writing laconically puts us at the front of the peloton, in a race whose winner wins the audience’s attention. The chances are that they will want to read what we want to communicate to them.

The curse of knowledge

I remember one definition from my study period: ‘a textual activity that updates a paradigm in syntagma’. Combine now man, what that is about. And the definition simply refers to speech. In fact, to writing it can also apply. Very often, when we write, we put the recipient at the same level of knowledge, of experience. We subconsciously assume that he or she has perceptual capabilities equal to ours. This is the so-called ‘curse of knowledge’, and its effect can be, for example, this notation:

‘The linguistic syntactic perspective, which serves to bring out the relationship between form and meaning, provides an opportunity to examine in a normative sentence the relation of conversion. This relation, projecting the way in which an event is superficially realised, implies a bipolarity in the view of its participants, meaning that X is seen from Y’s perspective, while Y is seen from X’s perspective. The recognition of the converse and the identification of the constituent members is influenced by the content of the predicative expression attached right-handedly by the modal operator.’

On the internet, you can find a pretty good tool for checking the difficulty level of a created text. It’s called the ‘clairvoyance score’. On a scale of 1 to 7, it assesses texts and the possibility of understanding it, where ‘1’ means a child’s easy text and ‘7’ a very complex, expert text that may require specialist knowledge to understand. The text above was given a rating of ‘7’. It is generally accepted that texts should be written at a level of ‘3’ – comprehensible to students in the final grades of primary school.

Marek Szeles

PR Expert

Tags for this entry:

Share entry:

Facebook
LinkedIn
X
WhatsApp
Reddit
Telegram
Email

You may also be interested in

Copywriter – craft or art?

The first literary figure in Poland to commit a misalliance with advertising was Melchior Wańkowicz. He was the author of the pre-war slogan ‘Cukier krzepi’

Gimbal, camera, action!

It used to be that recording equipment was powerful. It took up a lot of space and certainly did not weigh as much as two

Love in times of pestilence, or the art of public speaking

Who has conceived of what? Where can personal data be sold? What is neighbourhood through the vestibule? Is the virus fresh or old? Choć na

How do you promote your business online? Part 2

The first part of a short guide on how to take your business to the online space is behind us. You already know the best