Writing Clearly, Part Three

Writing clearly comes as much from understanding principles as from applying rules. Principles call us to work towards goals, and sometimes those goals are ideals. Rules give us limits, boundaries, and require us to stay within the lines drawn by the boundaries we define. Rules help us in some aspects of writing--rules of grammar, for instance, but in other aspects of writing, we have to rely on principles rather than rules.

One principle of writing clearly says that to understand the message of a piece of writing, we need to know who the characters are in that piece. This is as much as saying that whenever we write anything, whether we think of it as fiction or fact, we're telling a story. The clearest stories we tell tend to have the main characters serve as the subjects of our sentences. Here are a few examples:


There is no need, then, for argument aout the existence, the inevitability, and the desirability of change in language. There is need, however, for argument about the existence of such a thing as good English and correct English.

--Theodore Bernstein, The Careful Writer, quoted in Williams, Style: Ten Lessons in Clarity and Grace.

Having quoted Bernstein, Williams revises the passage like this:

While we need not debate whether language changes in ways that are inevitable and desirable, we do argue that there is such a thing as good and correct English.

Williams's version makes it clear who the characters of the "story" are here, and that is an important reason why most people will find the second version clearer than the first. Here's the third principle of clear writing: when you write, understand who the characters of your "story" are, and try to place the main characters as the subjects of your sentences.