{"id":1119,"date":"2015-11-06T10:21:47","date_gmt":"2015-11-05T21:21:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=1119"},"modified":"2015-11-06T10:21:47","modified_gmt":"2015-11-05T21:21:47","slug":"learn-from-the-best","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=1119","title":{"rendered":"Learn from the best"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?attachment_id=1117\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-1117\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-1117\" src=\"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Books1-300x290.jpg\" alt=\"Books1\" width=\"300\" height=\"290\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Books1-300x290.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Books1.jpg 525w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>When I first started writing for a living, one of the senior sub-editors took me to one side and gave me his \u2018new boy chat\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Most people\u2019s writing is heavily influenced by their reading,\u2019 he said.\u00a0 \u2018So read widely, but read wisely.\u00a0 Learn from the best and ignore the rest.\u2019\u00a0 Among the best, he counted Winston Churchill, Graham Greene, and Anthony Burgess.<\/p>\n<p>One of my tasks this week was to tidy up a veritable bucket of gobbledygook.\u00a0 The author was a man of science and a rising star in his organisation.<\/p>\n<p>If his writing is influenced by his reading, I would guess that he has read a lot of rather opaque scientific papers.\u00a0 He also seems to have absorbed more than his share of online \u2018clickbait news\u2019.\u00a0 \u2018Mineral supplements potentially as damaging as smoking a new study to be published in a prestigious journal later this week will suggest\u2019 seems to be his idea of literature.<\/p>\n<p>I sent him the edited prose and waited for his comments.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Spot on,\u2019 he said.\u00a0 \u2018That was exactly what I was trying to say.\u00a0 It\u2019s just that your version is easier to read.\u00a0 I wish that I could write like that.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>\u2018You can.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Yeah?\u2019<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Just stop reading writing that <em>isn\u2019t<\/em> easy to read.\u00a0 Seek out writing that is clear and concise.\u00a0 Seek out stories that say something to you.\u00a0 And if you find yourself confronted with umpteen pages of opaque mumble, politely ask the author if you can have a brief summary in plain English.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Thanks.\u00a0 I\u2019ll give it a go,\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When I first started writing for a living, one of the senior sub-editors took me to one side and gave me his \u2018new boy chat\u2019. \u2018Most people\u2019s writing is heavily influenced by their reading,\u2019 he said.\u00a0 \u2018So read widely, but &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=1119\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,6,4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1119"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1119"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1119\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1120,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1119\/revisions\/1120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}