Printing your work
Maël Balland, Pexels
Cherise Saywell
26 March 2020
Keep the title in view
Ulrich Wechselberger, Pixabay
Whether I’m writing a chapter of a book, a report, or indeed a blog post, I keep the title in front of me. I write on a computer but always have a notebook and pen next to it. I jot down the title when I am planning my writing and leave the title visible when I am putting the piece together. It serves as a reminder to keep the writing focused and not stray off-topic. I may even underline key words in the title. This technique is useful for any type of writing.
Amanda Swift
28 November 2019
The point of no return
Image credit: Debbie Toksvig
You’ve started writing an essay, Masters dissertation or PhD thesis. In my case, it’s a new novel. Somebody asks how it’s going, so I ask myself ‘Am I beyond the point of no return?’
Academic work involves a variety of points of no return. In a 1,500-word essay for which you’ve chosen a line of argument and three themes, it might be when you’ve covered two of those themes. You’ve drafted your introduction, written 800 words (400 for each theme) and your argument is working. For practical dissertations, you may reach the point of no return when you discover whether your data analysis confirms your hypothesis. For PhD students, it may be your upgrade from MPhil or writing a Year 2 progress report and research plan charting the road towards completion.
It’s important to celebrate these points of no return. Firstly, writing can be a lonely business, full of moments of self-doubt. A point of no return marks a milestone achieved. Secondly, passing a point of no return is the moment to switch from looking backwards, worrying ‘should I have started from there?’, to looking forwards towards the end. There will, of course, still be problems to overcome, but your commitment to going forward is built on solid foundations.
My point of no return is roughly 25,000 words into my historical novel. If my characters are lively, their dialogue unforced and my notebook abandoned, I’m over the point of no return and the book will be finished. Finishing is no guarantee of success but, like pressing ‘pay’ on a non-refundable holiday, the course is set.
Ah, you may be asking, but what happens if at 25,000 words the course isn’t set, the characters aren’t breathing, the dialogue is stodgy and I’m glued to my notebook of ideas? Setting a point of no return is the best way to prepare for such a possibility. It will force you to stop, take an objective look at your work and spot any wrong turns before you go any further.
In one-to-ones with PhD students during writing retreats, we discuss wrong turns, with ‘why didn’t I spot that earlier?’ a shared writerly torment. It’s good to discuss how to deal with that sick feeling of ‘wasted’ work. My colleague Lucy English has good advice about text recycling[1], and once you’re back on course it’s a comfort that even deleted work has its uses.
A point of return is a good friend. After you’ve either changed or confirmed your course, when somebody asks how the writing is going, you can reply with complete confidence ‘I’m beyond the point of no return’ and know that every writer from every age is cheering you on.
[1] Lucy English, ‘Don’t waste – recycle’ https://rlfconsultants.com/dont-waste-recycle/
24 October 2019
How writing starts to happen
Image credit: Sophie Kandaouroff
I was recently working with a group of registered nurses who were starting a one-year Master’s degree in specialist public health nursing. I had been briefed that they were academically able but tended to be anxious about writing critically. ‘The minute critical writing is mentioned, they write a nice descriptive account,’ said their tutor.
What did they most need? Solid practical advice, certainly, plus an understanding of how critical writing – about theory, policy and their own practice – could be useful to them. But I felt neither of those things would be much use if we didn’t try to deal with their anxiety. I sensed from experience, both the students’ and mine as a writer, that anxiety started with a dearth of confidence about beginning to write. What do your tutors want? Where do you start? How does composing a piece of writing start to happen?
I called the session ‘Critical, But Not Life-Threatening’. They saw the joke, and I can vouch for the pleasure you’ll get when you make 50 nurses laugh. I told them about two kinds of criticism: the critical evaluation of ideas that’s central to academic writing, and the self-criticism that can sap your confidence.
To succeed at one you have to overcome the other. As Peter Elbow brilliantly said, ‘Writing calls on two skills that are so different they usually conflict with each other: creating and criticising’. If we let our conscious critical mind judge us, it can stop us getting started with the composing process. We become prone to telling ourselves that we, in the form of our sentences, are inadequate or useless.
We do better if we save the criticism for later by writing a first draft relatively quickly and not trying to solve every problem as we go. We can help to feed our unconscious creative mind by doing something associated with writing every day — a short activity such as re-reading our notes.
The session became lively. Hands went up; students admitted their anxiety. One volunteered that she felt more relaxed at the thought of writing like this, and another, an experienced nurse, summed up very well how this sort of composing can become a sequence of activities we can all learn.
‘I really didn’t know you could break down the process of writing into steps like that,’ she said. I like to think I could hear her confidence growing.
23 May 2019
Inspiration plus perspiration
Image credit: Chris Scott
28 March 2019
Lose that redundant paragraph
What’s the best thing to do with the first paragraph of your essay? Write it, then put it in the bin. Now this isn’t always true, but it often is. Many writers ‘write themselves into it’, like an engine warming up before it runs properly. They might write vague opening lines like this: ‘Experts disagree about how best to begin an essay, and it is easy to feel confused by conflicting rules.’ You’ll often find that it is better to start with your second paragraph, which might start like this: ‘A surprising writing tip is to put your first paragraph in the bin.’ Typically, paragraph 2 is where you start getting down to the important stuff — and that’s precisely where your essay should begin. The writer Hilary Mantel put it most memorably. When you write that first paragraph, she asked, ‘are you performing a haka, or just shuffling your feet?’ Most of us, I’m afraid, start with a stiff shuffle. The agile, exciting, showy war-dance of the haka only gets going in paragraph two.
James McConnachie
21 March 2019
Paraphrasing
Paraphrasing is explaining what an author has said in your own words. It’s an important skill in academic writing that indicates that you have understood the source and are able to use it to advance your own argument.
Some students think that you can paraphrase by simply changing some of the nouns or verbs but keeping the sentence structure of your source. But to paraphrase properly, you need to really understand what you’re reading and be able to explain it.
Effective paraphrasing is a skill that can be learned. In workshops at Edinburgh University and Heriot Watt University, I try to encourage good paraphrasing by addressing two key principles: using your own words, and employing a sentence/paragraph structure that is different to the original. Here’s how to do it.
Read the passage first. Underline or highlight key phrases. Then put the text away. Now use your voice – I’m talking vocal chords here – to articulate what the text is saying. Pretend you’re explaining it to someone. You could give yourself an opening line, such as ‘Here, X argues for a novel methodology because . . .’ or ‘Y’s theory is important because . . .’ Once you have said it, scribble it down; it doesn’t matter if the style is informal — you can edit it into shape. Now check it against the original. Have you captured the essence of what the author is saying?
Cherise Saywell
7 March 2019
This… what?
Do you often start sentences with the words ‘This is’? If so, you might be making your reader sweat, while missing a chance to underline or refine the point you’re making. When you write ‘this is’, your reader is often forced to try to remember whatever it was in the last sentence you were talking about.
So remind them. This . . . what? This belief, this breakthrough, this reappraisal, this campaign, this experiment, this opportunity . . . You need to figure out precisely what you were talking about and then tell the reader in one single, crucial word. This is about more than just reminding the reader. (Actually, that sentence should be, ‘This technique is about more than just reminding the reader.’)
When you add a word between ‘this’ and ‘is’ you force yourself to reimagine, in an abstract way, the underlying nature of whatever it is you are describing. And that little move towards a higher-level evaluation of what it’s really all about, is the very essence of academic thinking.
James McConnachie
21 February 2019
Create breathing space in your writing
Paragraphs punctuate your writing, clarify your meaning and strengthen your argument. A typed page without paragraphs is like a wall of words; it’s very hard for the reader to find a way in to your writing, and it’s very hard for your meaning to get out. Paragraphs don’t add words but they do help get your point across. Remember: one point per paragraph. As a rule of thumb, I’d advise two to three paragraphs for each A4 page. Every paragraph is different, but many contain the following parts in the following order:
I Introduce the topic
D Develop the point / present your argument
E Give your Evidence
A Analyse / evaluate the evidence
S Summarise and lead on to the next point
Each new paragraph is like a breath of fresh air. It breaks up the text and improves readability, helping your reader to grasp the meaning.
Jen Green
24 January 2019
Where’s the conflict?
Image credit: Kona Macphee
17 January 2019
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