The Art and Sham of Writing

Creative writing software can help you to write better, so go ahead and click on that hyperlink if you want to see our product reviews.

Now that I've exposed one purpose of this article, I'll reveal my hidden purpose. Every writer has one. For some, it's putting subtle keywords into articles to make you buy a product or visit a website. Others seek adulation and praise from readers because their prose is just so darn good. Still others seek power through fiery political rhetoric and subversive words.

My agenda is for each reader to send $1, care of DB Troester, to fund a needed operation for my dog, Sal, who suffers from painful and malignant halitosis. Did I mention he lost his tail while saving a baby from a house fire and he's my best friend?

Yeah, well, that's so obvious it makes you gag. It's not even funny. Here's my real hidden purpose: to offer useful tips on writing, thereby completing this work assignment and washing my hands of it.

Disclaimer: I disavow responsibility for anyone who hurts himself or herself while attempting to apply these tips. The pain and liability are yours alone.

Some writing seeks to manipulate readers and thus it's a sham. And some seeks to entertain readers, flow smoothly and tell good stories and thus it's an art. However, some writing seeks merely to communicate and inform in a clear and straightforward manner. We reach for that type of writing at TopTenREVIEWS.com, to help you find the best software, consumer electronics and tech products for your needs.

"Writing uses written language to communicate an idea," says TopTenREVIEWS copy editor Susan Baxter. "There is definitely art to it. I mean, not everybody's a writer."

But everyone has to communicate in writing at some point in their lives, some more than others, even if it's just emails or text messages.

"I think you need training on what the rules are," says TopTenREVIEWS researcher/writer Kimberly Bowen. Baxter adds: "You have to know the rules before you can break them."

That's true, so here are some rules. Go ahead, learn them and break them. I'm making them up as I write this article, anyway. No sham there. I mean, no shame there.

1. Clarity is the overriding rule. Everything you write has to be clear so readers can understand it. If not, you've undermined your communication.
2. Keep your sentences short. I stole this from Ernest Hemingway. My corollary to this is that you shouldn't use commas or semicolons when a period will work; if part of a sentence can stand alone as a complete sentence, it should. An example is the sentence you just read. Break it into two sentences by replacing the semicolon with a period.
3. Strip yourself from your writing. Extract your biases and personal intentions from your writing. Only then can you expand your perspectives and your prose. This rule is not easy for most writers. But once you learn to write objectively in every case, you'll see writing as a craft, composed of symbols and components. It's just words, sentences and paragraphs that can combine in simple and complex ways to communicate and achieve simple and great purposes. "That's why I think writers make such good lawyers, because we can reframe information in any way that we need to reframe it," says TopTenREVIEWS researcher/writer Angela Parkinson.
4. Don't underestimate your readers. You can't put anything over on them. "I think any discerning reader can pick up on writing that's false," says TopTenREVIEWS researcher/writer Linda Thomson.
5. Don't stop writing until you're done. The real work is in the rewriting, so keep writing until you've completed the first draft of your article or assignment or story or book or product review or whatever. Then go back and rewrite and eliminate sentences, paragraphs, anything that doesn't add to the core premise of the article or chapter or section or review. One tip: Eliminate "the," "that" and "also" whenever possible.
6. Everyone needs an editor or editors. Listen to yours and follow their instructions, unless they're wrong.

That's it, except to stress the one key element of any writing, more important than the writer, words or messages, is you, dear reader. You give life to writing by reading it and you are the ultimate judge of whether writing is a sham or art form. Our purpose is to convey useful, clear information on the best software, consumer electronics and tech products for your needs. There's no sham or shame there.

At TopTenREVIEWS We Do the Research So You Don't Have To.