I feel that "Clutter" by William Zinsser emphasizes a really important point that people often ignore when they're writing; Words may sound great altogether in a sentence, and your point may get across successfully, but normally a lot of your words are unnecessary.
Zinsser says, in addition, that "each profession has its own jargon to fire at the layman and hurl him back from its walls," referring to the icky style that politicians and professionals use when speaking to the public. This is the most striking point to me because society seems to think that confusing the public will save us from knowing the grim realities. I'm sorry, but no -- its all unnecessary and annoying to me. Zinsser is right in criticizing this, and thats why I like his article and connect with it very well. However, this is a very professional sense of 'clutter', and we are just college students writing essays. Either way, we have our own 'clutter' that we could clean up on, which Zinsser writes about.
This is definitely an article that I would use as a remembrance for writing better essays. It will really help me with writing college-level essays and eliminating the unneeded sentences and words in my papers, and I recommend the rest of you remember the points made in "Clutter" as well for the future.
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The whole concept of "clutter" is defintely easy to understand. In high school and even before that, clutter was a way to make your paper long enough for the assignment. Now, that just seems like a ridiculous thougt. I really did like the point you brought up about politicians and "confusing the public". That is so true. Almost everytime a politician is asked a question, they do not really answer it. They just beg the question and use big words to make it seems as if they have. That is incredibly frustrating especially when it comes to big issues that need to be dealt with. On another blog politicians answering techniques are discussed and the issue with that is brought up(http://www.aglimmeroftruth.com/2006/10/why-cant-politicians-answer-questions.html). ABC.net also has an article about the words politicans use to make them sound like they are talking and answering questions, these are all sad but true (http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/02/17/2821714.htm?site=thedrum).
ReplyDeleteAfter reading this article I felt that Zinsser could take some of his own advice into account. He readily preaches to those writers who wish to better their ways, but fails to use his own techniques. For example, he claims that using large words is unnecessary and that simplicity is always better, but then goes on to use sentences like the following:
ReplyDelete"These locutions are a drag on energy and momentum."
or
"Clutter is the ponderous euphemism that turns a slum into a depressed socioeconomic area.."
This man's writing is irony at its best. In theory his ideas may seem like the end all, cure all to bad writing habits, but if the very writer of the information can't follow his own guidelines, how can he expect others to follow suit?
Furthermore, if every writer wrote this way (simplifying to the very core of the statement) , we'd have no voice, no complex novels to unravel and interpret, and really, the challenge in reading would disappear. Not to mention, we don't write like we speak, a little complexity can go a long way.
http://www.uefap.com/writing/feature/complex.htm