Post
by polymath » October 2nd, 2011, 9:36 pm
I've read and evaluated more than a few student papers where the writers inflate to achieve a word or page count expectation. They have the content down. Organization is the shortcoming that stands out, that and timely getting to and making a point. My advice is invariably to locate a main idea at sentence, paragraph, and larger scale levels and write to that idea.
One exercise I demonstrate and suggest is looking at how many nouns and prounouns a sentence has, asking if they're thematically related. If not, what's the main one. It quickly becomes apparent there's too many unrelated ideas crammed into one sentence. Same with paragraphs, especially when there's a wall of text per page. No paragraph indents. Smaller scale shortcomings benchmark larger scale shortcomings.
The basics, I know, of grammar and mechanical style that everyone's taught but for some reason are overlooked. Back to a fourth grade lesson I turn my struggling writers, or sentence diagramming on the fly. Subject, predicate, object syntax. One idea each per sentence. Subject subject to emphasis, i.e., what's the sentence really about, who mostly, but what, when, where, why, and how too. Sometimes an object, though, rather than an actor is the stronger subject. Once a writer understands syntax again then it's a comparatively simple process to break out the individual ideas into their own sentences and intended orders of emphasis. Word and page counts then become irrelevant as long as a text timely gets to the point. Same with paragraphs and larger scale structures.
Spread the love of written word.
My question is, since MSes are supposed to be double-spaced anyway, once it's edited and polished (obviously no 1st draft comes out "perfect"), is it OK to send out in 14pt if someone requests it? What about queries, synopses, etc., is 14pt OK for those?
