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Exercising the writing muscles – how I train as a writer

By on in business, copy writing, writing

I’ve been doing a lot of physical activity recently, running, cycling and swimming in preparation for a triathlon in a few weeks’ time. It’s tricky sometimes fitting it all in around my working hours. But I enjoy it, and so I make time for it.

Making time to write

Cyclist on Newcastle's Quayside

Cycling along Newcastle’s quayside

I believe writing’s a form of exercise too. You get better as you practice, learn new skills, gain confidence, or just a better understanding of what works and what doesn’t.

So I make time for writing too. Time to explore writing outside of work commitments. Time to try new things and to just enjoy writing for what it is – an important part of being me.

Learning by imitating

Most writers start out mimicking their heroes. I know I did. Somewhere in a box in the attic, there’s an exercise book filled with adventure stories in the style of C.S Lewis and tales of knights on horseback, battling dragons.

Reading was how I first learnt the elements of stories, about heroes and conflicts, quests and returns. Writing my own taught me about structure – beginnings, middles and endings.

Gathering skills

I learned techniques, hints and tips to bring my writing to life in English lessons. Using all the senses, and the power of metaphor and simile, and more about structure, rhythm and making words dance through poetry. They are techniques that serve me well as a business writer and copywriter.

At University one of my tutors used to set tasks to write essays in the style of the works we were studying – Philip Sidney, John Milton, Alexander Pope. That may sound like a cruel and unusual form of undergraduate torture. But in mimicking the rhetoric, or manipulating my thoughts into rhyming couplets, I became even more conscious of the skill and technique of the writers, and I understood their work at a deeper, more personal level. Of the hundreds of essays I wrote in my University terms, those are the only ones I remember.

Adopting voices

As a copywriter, the ability to adapt my writing to different styles is a very useful skill. It helps me sound like the brand or company I’m writing for.

But to make it sound authentic, it’s not really enough just to mimic. I believe you have to be able to add something of yourself. And in analysing the work of literary writers, I’ve learned to spot styles and forms that I can adopt and adapt in more commercial and contemporary writing.

How writing is like exercise

Running, cycling and swimming all take discipline and commitment if you want to improve. The same is true of writing.

Just as you don’t know how far or fast you can go until you really try, you’ll never realise your writing potential on a blank page – sometimes you just have to fill it.

The mind seeks meaning

By on in copy writing, words, writing

Meaning. It’s something our minds instinctively reach out for. I was reminded of this whilst listening to some music as I worked on a piece of writing last week. The lyrics of a familiar song took on a new resonance, because of what I was writing about, and I discovered a meaning in them that I hadn’t noticed before.

As human beings we are supremely adept at recognising patterns and seeking out connections. I once took part in a writing exercise that demonstrates this beautifully.

Basho's house, Japan

The home of Japanese haiku writer, Basho

As a group, we were each asked to write a haiku – a Japanese verse form of three lines, made up of five, seven and five syllables. We wrote the last line separately from the first two, then mixed them up and paired them at random to form a new haiku.

You might think the results would be meaningless. But it was amazing how often the last line, although written by someone thinking of an entirely different subject, fitted perfectly and how it drew out new themes from the ones that preceeded it. That was a result of our minds creating connections, seeking out meaning.

Of course, in business writing, you don’t want to make a customer have to work as hard as we did with our haiku to discover the message you’re trying to convey.

Straight, clear, simple and direct is the best way to ensure attention from busy eyes surrounded by thousands of messages every day. Yet there still needs to be space for the reader to get involved and create meaning for themselves.

I use an example in my writing workshops of a message that, in trying to tell you what a complex product does, actually blurs any kind of understanding, because it bombards you with a paragraph of over 40 words. It ends up being empty verbage, and so difficult to read that people get stuck half way through and have to go back to the beginning to try and make any sense of it.

In its over exuberance, trying to tell you everything you ever needed to know in one go, it loses connection with its audience. It’s not helped by the fact that it’s a single sentence full of meaningful sounding, but intangible words like flexibility, stability and strategic.

Connecting with an audience, is often about helping them make the mental leap to think ‘that applies to me’. Using tangible terms really helps. So, for example, showing how something could “help you work just as well in the office as out of it”, rather than using an intangible word like ‘flexibility’, can really help your readers understand what it would be like to use the product or service.

If, as a writer, I can make someone think ‘yes, that’s just like me…’  or ‘I’d like that…’, then I’ve caught their attention and they’re more likely to carry on reading to discover more.

Making connections – 26 Under a Northern Sky

By on in creative, travel, words, writing

Connections. That’s what a group of writers were making as we travelled north this weekend.

photo of rail tickets

Tickets for 26 Under A Northern Sky journey

The reason for our journey was to launch the latest 26 project, 26 Under A Northern Sky – a collection of creative writing inspired by the music of Nick Drake and a railway journey between Newcastle upon Tyne and Glasgow.

We were making real connections with trains and timetables, to get where we needed to be at the appointed time and make our way back again. But through the creative writing process and the journey itself, many more connections were revealed.

Each writer was given a brief. Take the name of one of the 26 stations along the line and the title of a Nick Drake track, chosen at random and write something in response. The final constraint was that the piece should be able to be read aloud comfortably in 3 mins 44 seconds or less – the duration of Nick Drake’s Northern Sky, which provides the title for the whole collection.

The resulting pieces were wide ranging in style and tone. We had poems and short stories, a sonnet, folk tales, histories and ghost stories. Each one was read along the journey. And each writer had found a different way to connect to their brief.

Some responded to the place, its location, history or a claim to fame. Others took the songs, their lyrics, form and rhythm as inspiration. And many combined the two, to come up with something that touched on both, but that was made new and different by being reflected through the prism of each writer’s own experience.

It’s the same in business writing. There is a brief from a client, that often comes with rules and constraints. As a writer I have to find a way to connect to that brief and interpret it in a way that will connect with a customer. That may mean digging deeper to discover how a customer thinks and feels and finding the words that make that connection. And the final creative piece is always a collaboration between writer, designer  and client.

Woman reading on a train

Faye Sharpe reading her contribution to 26 Under a Northern Sky

The 26 Under a Northern Sky project similarly came with deadlines and timetables, with writers asked to submit first and then final drafts after feedback from a small team of editors.

As Editor in Chief, I had the privilege of being the first to read the entire collection. And it was a joy.

In this project I acted as both client and creative; contributing my own piece, while making sure the whole collaboration remained on track. It’s taught me a lot about setting a brief and then allowing creative people the freedom to explore it in their own way.

Each piece in 26 Under a Northern Sky is unique, but each writer has found a way to connect to the brief and through that created a piece of work that connects with a wider audience.

I’m very proud to have been part of something very special.

26 Under A Northern Sky will be published on www.26.org.uk later this week. But you can enjoy the beautiful introduction to the collection, written by Anna Jauncey right now.

About 26

26 is a diverse group of people who share a love of words. Many of us work with words for a living, as writers, language specialists, editors, designers or publishers, but anyone who cares about words is welcome to join. Together, we hope to raise the profile and value of words not only in business, but also in everyday life.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to all the writers, editors and readers of 26 Under A Northern Sky:
Anna Jauncey, Sue Evans, Fiona Thompson, June Mong, Sharon Jones, Joan Lennon, Tony Balazs, Laura Waddell, Faye Sharpe, Simon Parsons, John Simmons, Kenneth Stirling, Justina Hart, Stephen Potts, Alastair Creamer, Colette Davis, Jo Matthews, Stuart Delves, Aidan Baker, Irene Lofthouse, Mike Benson, Marianne Powell, Elaine Gibb, Sophie Gordon, Martin Lee, Tom Collins and especially to my co-editor, Sandy Wilkie. Thanks also to Rachel Marshall and Elen Lewis for promoting the project through the 26 website and newsletter.

Special thanks to Michael Burdett of The Strange Face Project for introducing me to the music of Nick Drake and providing the initial spark that lead to this crazy writing project.

A smile in the mind

By on in copy writing, words, writing

Celandine. The word pops into my head as I cycle past a clutch of small yellow flowers in the undergrowth beside a familiar track.

A small yellow flower with 9 petals

Lesser celandine

My brain has plucked a rarely used word from the depths of my memory. A word from I know from Flower Fairy books and trips to the park with my Nanna, who seemed to know the name of every plant and tree there was. I roll it round in my mouth and say it out loud. It sounds like springtime.

When I look it up later, I discover that celandines are associated with the return of the swallows and that the lesser version with its heart shaped leaves was much loved by Wordsworth.

It’s an uncommon word. In my business writing I’m on the watch out for these. Usually they are pieces of  jargon or commercial terms that just don’t sound like something our customers would use in their everyday conversation. So I have to find an alternative, a different way of explaining the idea I want to convey using clear and natural terms.

But, as I was reminded recently, clear doesn’t mean the same as mundane. I believe that sometimes, even in business writing, it’s good to have a word that surprises you.

In my writing workshops, I often ask people for their favourite word. Some choose a word like ‘holiday’, which is popular by association; others choose words which sound great or feel nice in your mouth when you say them, like ‘murmur’ or ‘hullaballoo’. One thing they all have in common is that they naturally smile as they say them.

An unexpected word can be a delight. While I think it unlikely I’ll find a place for ‘celandine’ in the next marketing email that I write, I’ll continue to look for opportunities to use words like it that put a smile in your mind.

Appearing at the Oxford Story Museum

By on in books, creative, writing

There’s a place in Oxford called The Story Museum. It’s just re-opened after a bit of a break, with an exhibition called 26 characters, which features 26 famous authors dressed as their favourite character from childhood, photographed by Cambridge Jones.

The list of writers is like a who’s who of children’s literature and includes some of my contemporary favourites. There’s Neil Gaiman as Badger from Wind in the Willows, Philip Pullman as Long John Silver, Terry Pratchett as Just William, Malorie Blackman as the Wicked Witch of the West; Julia Donaldson, Holly Smale, Francesca Simon (of Horrid Henry fame), Benjamin Zephaniah, Michael Rosen and many others.

And thanks to my wonderful writing mentor, John Simmons, a piece of my writing features there too. I’m a member of a writing organisation called 26 (after the number of letters of the alphabet) ideally linked to the theme of this exhibition. So, I was invited  to contribute a poem, to accompany one of the portraits.

The 26 writers were matched completely randomly with an author and a letter of the alphabet. We got to see Cambridge Jones’ splendid photographs of our author and were set the task of writing a sestude – a literary form of exactly 62 words (26 in reflection).

I positively squeaked when I discovered that my author, Steven Butler, had chosen The Hatter from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland as his favourite character. I love Alice in Wonderland and the characters have continued to inspire some of my creative writing.

Michelle reading The Horse and His Boy

Enjoying one of my favourite books from childhood again. Photo by Mike Tulip

I didn’t know Steven Butler’s work, so I quickly read a couple of his books and found out a bit more about him. He’s written a fabulously funny series called ‘The Wrong Pong’ which tells the story of how Neville Briskett is mistaken for a young troll and sucked down the toilet to Underland.  And more recently, he’s written ‘The Diary of Dennis the Menace’.

I loved ‘ The Wrong Pong’ and think it’s a great series for children to read for themselves. It has the right mix of disgusting, yuckyness to put off most adults as well as being a cracking adventure story that rips along  at a fair pace.

It’s been great to discover a new writer who I wouldn’t normally come across too. I really like the way he creates his characters, especially the troll family who adopt Neville and absolutely love the special language they use. I was delighted to be able to include one of Steven’s brilliant made-up words in my sestude which you can read on the Story Museum’s website.

I’ve also written about one of my favourite childhood characters, Aravis from the Horse and His Boy for the museum’s digital gallery. Thanks to Mike Tulip for taking the accompanying photo.

It would be enough to have a poem in an exhibition alongside some of our most brilliant writers, but to have the chance to pay tribute to one of Lewis Carroll’s most memorable characters in the city where he first created Wonderland is a real honour, and a little daunting.

But Carroll wasn’t just an Oxford man. He has connections with the North East of England, where I live too. He visited members of his family who lived at Whitburn, and according to his letters, wrote the first verse of the poem ‘Jabberwocky’ while he was in the area. So there’s a nod to that in my poem too.

I studied Carroll at university and later researched the influence of the North East landscape on his work for a feature I produced whilst working at the BBC. You can see what I discovered about Lewis Carroll’s connections with the North East on this archived website.

I haven’t seen the exhibition yet, but thanks to stalking the story museum on twitter, I’ve seen a few glimpses. It seems each room becomes the setting for a different character, so I look forward to stepping into Narnia, Neverland and Wonderland when I go to visit in May.

It’s been a brilliant project to work on. The only difficulty has been keeping it secret for so long. And now I can’t wait to see it for myself. The exhibition lasts until December, so if you’re in Oxford and go to see it, I’d love to hear what you think.

How readable is your writing?

By on in business, writing

That 20 page document outlining in detail the research, findings and recommendations of your latest project is easy to read, right? You know the subject in detail. You’ve been working on it for months. It’s obvious… isn’t it?

To you, it may be. But what about your audience? The person who picks it up and reads it for the first time? What does it tell them?

Do they look at it and groan, put off by the thought of reading pages and pages of tight-packed text with long sentences and paragraphs that go on, and on and on? Will they be baffled by jargon? Stumped by acronyms? Wonder why on earth this is relevant to them?

Is it well organised and structured in a logical way? Does it have a beginning, middle and end? Do your conclusions actually conclude anything?

These are all questions and challenges that came up for discussion during one of my business writing training sessions.

There’s lots you can do to make your documents easy to read, starting with thinking about your audience and writing for them, not yourself.

RAdding an apostrophe eadability checker

Here’s one little tip to see how easy your writing is to read:

When you do a grammar and spelling check on a Word document, (because you all do that don’t you?) did you know you can also see how easy it is to read?

Word can show you readability statistics. To turn this option on:

  1. Click the File tab, and then click Options.
  2. Click Proofing.
  3. Under When correcting spelling and grammar in Word, make sure the Check grammar with spelling check box is selected.
  4. Select Show readability statistics.

Next time you’ve finished checking the spelling and grammar of your document you’ll see information about its reading level.

Sadly, just having the statistics may not help you understand whether it’s easy to read or not. So for a quick guide to what the numbers actually mean and an online version of the scorecard, I like this readability checker from The Writer.

Finding the joy of business writing

By on in copy writing, Dark angels, language, Marketing, words, writing

I gave blood yesterday. There’s sometimes a bit of a wait, so I grabbed a book to pass the time. Having finished my most recent fictional treat, I picked one off my desk – Room 121 by John Simmons and Jamie Jauncey.

The front cover proclaims it “a masterclass in writing and communication in business”. I say it’s a really good read.

It takes the form of a dialogue, a conversation between the two writers, sharing their thoughts, wisdom and experience of writing for many different kinds of business. And having spent many wonderful hours in their company on a couple of Dark Angels writing courses, I can hear John and Jamie’s voices in my head as I read it.

I opened it at random to find John speaking to Jamie about the joy of writing (page 119 if you’re interested). As a copywriter for a large company, it’s sometimes something hard for me to find. It’s a challenge to keep things fresh when you’re covering the same subjects or writing about the same products over a sustained period of time.

But I find ways. Sometimes I take a sideways approach, starting a draft in a deliberately different style, or with a word chosen at random from a nearby book. Or I begin the assault on the blank page by free writing, just spending 15 minutes or so taking my pen for a walk, writing non stop, banishing the inner editor and seeing where it takes me. There’s usually a phrase or combination of words, a nugget that gives me a way in to the next, more focused draft.

Yesterday’s moment of joy came from using the word ‘palaver’ in a piece I was writing. Palaver – what a wonderful playful word. Doesn’t it just make you smile? Don’t you want to say it? To feel it tumble around your mouth?

It’s not a word you might expect to see in a piece of business writing. But it was a direct quote from a customer, a fish and chip shop owner describing the experience of using his software saying: “There’s no faff. There’s no palaver.” Perfect. Real words. Authentic, natural and robust language. They gave me a small moment of joy. I reckon we need more of that in business writing.

Read more from John Simmons and Jamie Jauncey on their blogs.

Writing with a sense of place

By on in creative, Dark angels, language, travel, words, writing
La Finca

Our outdoor classroom in Aracena

I’ve been thinking recently about how a sense of place influences my writing.

In September I spent four glorious days on a Dark Angels creative writing in business course in Aracena, Spain. My fellow writers all drew on the landscape, the history and the culture of the area to produce some highly imaginative and creative writing. It was truly magical to hear the different voices and interpretations of the exercises we did together during the day and to revel in a final evening of stories and performances.

The first day, we used a passage from Don Quixote as inspiration, and along with the warm sunshine, good company and relaxed atmosphere, it’s encouraged my recent writing to take on a rather lyrical, allegorical tone.

Compare and contrast with a few years ago, when I visited Japan. There my writing took on the style of the haiku. Pared back. Economical. Each word working hard. Packed with meaning. I have a notebook filled with poems and scraps of free verse from my time there. And when I think of Japan, that’s the kind of language that fills my mental landscape.

I’ve also recently written a piece about where I live. For this I drew on both the geographical setting of the river that runs nearby, and the voices of its history. For this is an area of rich voices, identifiable by their distinctive accent. I wasn’t born here, so it’s not my accent; but listening to The Unthanks sing of the shipyards, I can fair see the bulkheads blocking out the daylight or hear the pounding of boots on the slipway.

Professionally I write for one client. One tone of voice. But it has to have something of all these voices. It has to be economical, because I write for busy people who want me to get to the point. But it cannot be too obscure. They cannot be expected to work hard to find the meaning.

So, I look for the phrases that will surprise and delight. The words that show there’s a real human being behind those marks on the paper or screen. Sometimes that means a change of rhythm or pace. Sometimes it’s a colloquial phrase – something you’d actually say.

Though I have to be careful not to be too colloquial. I was recently asked to rewrite a line where I used ‘tea’ in the northern sense of ‘dinner’ or a meal you have in the evening. After all, not all our customers are northerners.

I’ve been asked if writing for one client can get boring. It can be a challenge certainly, to keep it fresh and interesting when covering the same themes. But there’s always a new way of looking at things, new insights from our customers or new influences from the wider world to take on board.

And when I spend some time thinking about my writing, I can see that I do adopt different voices – at work, on my blog, and in my personal writing. They’re all slightly different, but all part of me. And they’re all influenced by people I’ve met, places I’ve visited. To me, it’s a rich source of inspiration.

Does a sense of place influence your writing too?

If you want to know more about what happens on a Dark Angels writing course, tutor John Simmons describes it beautifully in his latest blog post. 

When long copy works

By on in copy writing, words, writing

Twitter directed me to a great advert for Dutch railways this week:
https://twitter.com/Brilliant_Ads/status/390493772356026368/photo/1

It’s a fantastic example of long copy being used effectively.

Often in the world of marketing, we’re told, keep it short, make it simple. And that’s usually excellent advice. But as all good writers know, sometimes you have to break the rules. And that’s what this advert does. But it doesn’t do it to be self consciously shocking, or clever (like companies who try to introduce a made up word). It does it in a sympathetic way, one that makes its audience smile.

The message is basically, saying ‘If you’d taken the train, you wouldn’t be stuck in traffic.’ And I’m sure some organisations would have gone with a message that was a variant on that theme.

But consider the audience for this advert. They are people sitting in their cars, frustrated at being stuck in heavy traffic, most likely trying to get to work, to school, to meetings on time. They are assailed by a mass of messages – stop, go, turn left, don’t speed, traffic lights, road crossings, directions. Do they really need another one barking orders at them? Or making them feel stupid for choosing to take the car?

Road signs and warnings have to be absorbed quickly and easily, so they’re often made up of symbols and short words. In this environment full of instructions and commands, the longer, more literary copy stands out as something different.

It’s dramatic, that’s true. Quickly painting a scene, setting up character and suspense – how did she get there, what happens next…? Everyone loves a story.

And then the pay off, the point of the advert, which is to make you think about how things would be if you were somewhere else. If you were on a train, you might be able to read the whole of the story, or another story, or at least escape the frustrations of being stuck behind a big yellow bus. A built in benefit to encourage you to change your habits.

Very clever, very smart. And all done with the right words in the right place.

 

Obama’s victory speech

By on in language, words, writing

So America has re-elected President Obama for a second term. And for me, one of the highlights of the whole campaign (or what I saw of it) was his rousing acceptance speech.

I love to hear President Obama speak. He undoubtedly has many people who help him write these important public communications, but he comes across as a very fine communicator.

So I thought I’d take a closer look at his latest speech to see if I can spot some of the tips and tricks that make it so effective. You can read or listen to the whole thing on the BBC News website.

Firstly, let’s consider his language. This is a highly educated, well informed man who no doubt spends a lot of time in meetings and discussions with similar high powered politicians. I’m sure President Obama understands words like synergy and leverage, but they are not the kind of words he uses in his speeches. Instead he opts for simple, straightforward words, the kind of language regular people use every day and understand.

He begins with ‘Tonight’ – a simple word that sets a marker for a significant moment. It’s repeated four more times during the speech – each time bringing you back to the here and now.

Within his opening address he talks of moving forward. In fact he uses the phrase ‘moves forward’ three times in quick succession. As ‘Forward’ was his campaign slogan, that’s hardly surprising, but it’s a nice nod to continuity, to consolidating the promises he’s made on the campaign trail.

And the pattern of three is important too. Look at the text of the speech and you’ll find numerous examples where a word or phrase is repeated three times, or he cites three examples. For example “That’s why we do this. That’s what politics can be. That’s why elections matter” or “We believe in a generous America, in a compassionate America, in a tolerant America.”

You’ll often find this pattern of three in speeches and presentations. In Obama’s speech, he’s using it for impact and to add a pattern and rhythm which makes it appealing to the ear.

But three is a powerful concept. Shakespeare is littered with examples  – “Friends, Romans, countrymen…” Even Steve Jobs used it in his keynote presentations. And  that’s because it’s memorable. Something about the way our brains work makes three more memorable than six or eight. If you’re looking for people to hold things in their mind in the short term, then three is the ideal number.

Of course if you always use patterns of three, your speech may become laboured, and stilted, sounding contrived and unnatural. Obama knows this and breaks the pattern up into twos and fours. For example, he talks of “love and charity and duty and patriotism.” And later he says “I have never been more hopeful about our future. I have never been more hopeful about America.”

It’s easy to see this kind of thing when you read the speech in its written form, but it’s important to remember that this is a speech. It’s meant to be received by your ears not your eyes. The patterning and repetition helps there of course, highlighting things you may want to remember, drawing our attention to particular points, creating a subtle melodic rhythm that makes it appealing.

But it’s even more important to consider the setting. Sure, Obama’s on a winning podium surrounded by his supporters, so he’s pretty much assured of a rousing reception. But think about what he has to work with. It’s just one man, using his voice and body language to make his point. No slides, no powerpoint, no props.

So what does he do? How does he carry the audience with him? He tells stories.

He speaks about “the determination in the voice of a young field organiser who’s working his way through college,” and “the pride in the voice of a volunteer who’s going door to door because her brother was finally hired when the local auto plant added another shift.”

It’s all very well talking about big ideas like belief and hope, but Obama knows we need something real and tangible, something we can picture in our minds and hold onto. That’s what the stories give us. They humanise the big themes, make them real and personal.

And it’s interesting that he chooses to make us hear them, rather than just see them. A sign that he is alluding to the power of other voices as well as his own, perhaps?

I don’t know about you, but I get the feeling these are real stories. Certainly when he goes on to speak about meeting the family with the young daughter with leukemia, that’s a very real, personal and powerful anecdote that sticks in the mind.

Now, I’m no expert on political speeches, but I do enjoy listening to a good speaker or presenter, be they an actor, presenter or politician. I’ve no doubt that Obama’s speech was drafted, studied and edited several times before it was delivered.

But if you have a speech or presentation to make, there is a lot you could learn from this one. From the simple, concrete language through to selected repetition and patterning, and the power of stories to forge an emotional connection with your audience.

And there’s no need for Powerpoint slides.