Why
Not Say It Clearly: A Guide to Scientific Writing – Lester S. King, M.D. (1978)
As I move through life my eyes are constantly
on the hunt for new reading material.
I work at a medical school, and often find stacks of medical books and
publications being offered as free giveaways.
I will grab something if it appeals to me. This book, one of the most informative texts
I have read concerning good writing and how to best achieve it, caught my
eye.
Dr. Lester S. King wrote this after
a long medical and educational career.
He was just as frustrated by poorly written student dissertations as he
was by obtusely worded journal articles.
Dr. King understood that what is learned in school is often codified in
practice. It then is never questioned,
leading to an ossification of the written language used by scientists and
science writers. This book is his
attempt at pinpointing what makes a sentence or paragraph “good” or “bad” and
how to best achieve good writing in one’s own work.
The title of this books sums up everything
inside. The question “Why not say it
clearly?” is one that helps summarize much of what Dr. King teaches in the
book. He divides everything into
chapters that build upon each other. He
initially describes the present situation in scientific writing. How and why modern scientific writing is so
stilted and unspecific is discussed. A
lot of blame is given to the widely-accepted use of the passive voice, and how
it defeats the scientific goals of specificity while maintaining an illusory
sense of professional detachment. In
much science writing the author will state something like “The results were
entered by the researcher,” when they are speaking about themselves. It is much more accurate and specific to say “I
entered the results.” It is active, and
gets the point across without adding extra words or clumsy phrases.
Dr. Lester S. King goes on. One chapter discusses five “treacherous
servants.” These are aspects of language
that, while necessary, can become crutches or problems. An example is the overuse of the word “very.” While a researcher may write, “The experiment
was very intense and very difficult,” nothing of value is actually lost if
instead they wrote, “The experiment was intense and difficult.” Another example is the use of the word “it”
where a specific noun would convey more information.
One of my favorite chapters
discussed the differences between editing and revision. As Dr. King describes, Editing is the correction
of the writing in someone else’s work.
An Editor must try as hard as possible to keep the language in the style
of the original writer. Certain
corrections can be made but an Editor should never change the content or intent
of the writer. Revision is the process
of correcting the writing in one’s own work.
Revision allows the writer to rethink his original ideas, to rewrite
passages, or to edit out sections that may seem unnecessary. I have been both an editor and a writer
revising his work. It is very
informative.
In a chapter that had relevance to
this blog, the author discusses the qualities of book reviews, and how best to
write and utilize them. Dr. King spent
many years as Head Editor of scientific journals. Some years they would receive over 2,000
books and manuscripts for review. His
process involved winnowing out the 40-50% of works that had merit, then
dividing that list up even further. The
journal had a section with a listing of “New titles out this month,” a section
with 20-25 unsigned notices of 60-80 words, basically a small description of
the work in question. After that came the full, 500-900 word reviews, signed by
the reviewer. This allowed him to
disperse the knowledge that these new books existed, and to speak in-depth
about the ones he felt were of real value to most of his audience.
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