Who are you writing for?

Tags

audience, reader, writing for

You’ve just finished writing, what you believe to be, your best monthly report ever!

The words you see on the page have been organised into poetic charm.  Your boss is going to love reading this report.

No boring biz-buzz.  Not this time.

No, you think—this time I’ve got it nailed.  This time the boss’ socks are going to be knocked clean off his feet with this little beauty!

The long-awaited day has arrived.

You beam widely as you outstretch your hand to release the report across the table to your boss.  You leave his office feeling quite chuffed with your efforts.  You marvel at some the ‘pearlers’ you weaved into the content to spice it up.

“He’s going to like this one” you tell yourself as you head off for a well-deserved latte.

Meanwhile, the boss stretches back in his chair and picks up the report.

Your report.  The report you spent several nights working late to finish.

He leans forward.  His eyebrows knit together.  He reads several pages into the report yet his brow remains furrowed.

The boss picks up the next report to read – a colleague’s report.  Again, he reads and his brow furrows. By now, his face is beginning to resemble a Shar Pei digging for a buried bone.

He continues reading until five monthly reports are stacked up in his outbox.  Exhausted, he gets up from his desk to walk out of his office.  He needs to clear his head.  A walk around the block might just unravel his congested synapses.

“Why can’t they just give me what I want?” he asks himself.  “Why do they always write what they think I want to hear?”

The Art of Being An Exceptional Writer

1.  Know  Your Audience / Readers

The ‘art’ of writing requires that you as an artist, a writer, must be able to put yourself in your readers’ shoes to understand who they are and what is of interest and is meaningful to them—what is it your reader wants to know?

It doesn’t matter if you are the writer of a monthly business report or the writer of great novels, the principle remains the same – write for your reader.

Of course, you also need to define the purpose of your communication or message.  This has a direct bearing on what you write, how you organise the content, the style and voice you use to answer what your reader wants or needs to know.

In the case of the monthly business report scenario, your message and content needs to get right to the point of the report – what’s been happening through the month based on data and facts.

The more details you have, the more your reader (the boss) will grasp what has been going on.  Most importantly, you need to report the results of your activities.  This implies you’ll need to do some analysis, which goes beyond just describing the activities.  This helps your boss do what he or she does best – make decisions.

To be continued …  How do you think this story is going to end?

Verb vitality!

Tags

imperative, verbs, writing

Want to add some spice and sizzle to passive, sleepy copy?

You can. With a liberal sprinkling of verbs.

Verbs are magic grammatical elements. These little gems turn the table on the passive voice, up end it and re-architect the passive to become active.

In fact, a member of the verb family, the imperative, can downright whip a jumble of words, omitting the subject as it does, into a sentence of command. A sentence of order. Standing to attention in short, sharp active, instructional context.

For example, the imperative is very much at home gracing the pages of recipe books. It shows up in sentences such as, “Remove excess fat from chicken …” or “Heat oil in wok …”. As we read these instructions, we follow, without hesitation, the action for each task from start to finish anticipating we can recreate a tasty meal or treat as our reward. This is the power of the imperative. We take action.

Verbs are good time managers. The tenses (past, present or future) tell us when an action is happening. For example, in the sentence, “I’m reading a fantastic novel”, it is clear that in the present, “I continue to read this book” – at this time. But if I said that “I’ve read that novel”, then it is clear the action has been done – it happened in the past although we don’t know how far back in the past. Of course, we could always qualify it.

So, if we want to write lively prose we should use verbs in present tense. It doesn’t really matter if our verb choice is regular or irregular. However, tense does matter. Let’s look at this sentence, written in the passive voice, “As a dog was running across the field, a rabbit dashed under the fence.” OK, how can we sparkle it up? Let’s try, “A rabbit dashed under the fence as a dog ran across the field.”

Does this sentence have the same meaning as the first one? Yes.

What about the verb tense, does it convey the same meaning? Yes. A rabbit went under the fence at the same time that a dog ran across the field. Albeit, the second sentence does position the ‘rabbit’ as being in the spotlight (as subject) rather than the ‘dog’, as the case of the first sentence.

Irrespective, you get the idea.

So, next time you must write that report, business copy, presentation or client letter, turn up the heat. Oust the passive. Use a generous sprinkling of verbs and watch your writing come to life with power and vitality.

Mind over matter

Tags

lateral epicondylitis, mind over matter, tennis elbow

It has been some time since I’ve visited the blogosphere. The last time I contributed in the cyber community, I was optimistic and confident I’d be a regular blogger again. But alas, it didn’t happen, I’m sorry to say.

Despite my good intentions, it became physically and painfully difficult to put fingers to keyboard at the end of the day (after spending all day on a computer). You see, the episode of ‘lateral epicondylitis’ (tennis elbow) that I was absolutely convinced was improving, had its own agenda of recovery and this wouldn’t be accelerated no matter how much I wanted or willed it to happen.

From my view, recovery has been a slow, arduous process. Even after I had agreed to have a cortisone (non-steroid, of course) injection, which initially did improve the condition, I was not entirely pain free (which is what I expected). Twinges have hovered in the background, which was a reminder to me that the condition was still holding on. As time marched on, the initial relief I felt as a result of the cortisone, dwindled (much to my dismay).

Throughout the entire recuperation/treatment process, I have worn a brace to support my arm and elbow. Up until last month, I had religiously performed specific strengthening exercises but the pain hasn’t gone and I’m convinced, the condition hasn’t improved.

Pain is a funny thing. The longer it is around, the more companionable it can become. That probably sounds a little psychotic but the point is, when we become used to a certain state, it becomes the status quo and we feel less inclined to make a change. I’m almost resigned to thinking that the twinges of pain I feel in my elbow after working for long periods, are now the status quo.

Physiologically, I’ve adjusted accept that my elbow now hurts after prolonged use but I think acceptance is also a mind shift in giving us the strength to keep going and to push ourselves that little bit more. I’ve found that I can work through the pain to do just a little more. I expect this is akin to athletes who push just that little further each time they train, pushing through the pain barrier to improve their time or strength. I do think that it is the mind that allows you to carry on in a certain direction or not. Perhaps, this is a lesson in life to learn more about mind over matter?

Do you or someone you know have an inspiring story to share on ‘mind over matter’ for pain relief, triumphing in the face of adversity or succeeding against the odds?

Launching back into the blogosphere

Tags

blogosphere, Diane Setterfield, Lisbeth Salander, Mikael Blomkvist, Stieg Larsson, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, The Thirteenth Tale

Fellow bloggers and devoted readers,

I hope you’ll forgive my absence over the last month or two. Social Graces hasn’t surreptitiously abandoned the blogosphere but needed to stop blogging ‘cold turkey’ for a little while for medical reasons.

My right hand (both figuratively and literally) was afflicted with acute tendonitis or lateral epicondylitis (in laymen’s terms “tennis elbow”).

To be honest, it wasn’t blogging that caused my injury. My right forearm certainly did protest, however, when I put fingers to keyboard so, I took leave of blogging to give my arm the convalescence it demanded and needed.

It’s hard for me to believe that almost three months have passed now. I’d had varying degrees of pain in my right elbow despite regular treatment of:

physio with heat packs, ice packs and electrodes twice a week

two courses of anti-inflammatories

an arm brace

strengthening exercises; and finally

a cortisone injection which seems to have done the trick

I’m happy to report my arm is getting better. But I’m not about to push the boundaries too far just yet since I’m not entirely out of the woods.

Who would have thought blogging could be so dangerous?

Having taken leave of absence from blogging, I turned to indulging one of my other passions – reading!

One of the books that was an absolute must to read, was the final book in Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest” (my thoughts on that later).

Coming to the last chapters of “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest” the book, I started reading “The Thirteenth Tale” by Diane Setterfield. I loved this book (more about it later). Both books uncovered characters of intrigue and curious interest so it was important to keep the storylines separate. Easy, one story for daylight hours and the other for night-time. It worked well. Eventually, the final pages for each story were turned, read and the back cover drew the curtains on the words, ‘The End’. Mind you, I didn’t finish reading the books at the same time. No. The first novel closed was “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest”. With this great work of fiction at its finale, I was able to let the characters and story go so I was then able to focus on the remaining book as my arm continued to heal.

For now, I’m easing back into the blogosphere with tentative steps and looking forward to reconnecting again.

Latest Read – Zeitoun by Dave Eggers

Tags

Dave Eggers, Hurrican Katrina, New Orleans, Zeitoun

I used to think of New Orleans as a magical place of music – jazz, rhythm and blues – Mardi Gras, the French Quarter, Creole and Cajun food.

But since reading about the wrath of Hurricane Katrina as she struck New Orleans on August 2005 and the horrors that emerged as a result of the Bush Administration’s inaction or reluctance to act, I now view New Orleans in a completely different light.

Apart from what we saw on our television or computer screens, which was horrifying enough, after reading Dave Eggers’ (author of the best-known work, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, which I think I’ve also read many years ago) novel, Zeitoun, I simply felt very angry. I felt angry with Bush (not that this was particularly new – I found the man to be a fool on the world stage) and the abuse he bestowed upon his own people, angry with American injustices heaped on others in the world, and angry with the exalted view most Americans hold of themselves in the world, which I think is precipitated by some sort of collective denial or ignorance that others actually exist in the world.

Eggers’ novel is a moving true-story of Abdulrahman Zeitoun, a Syrian-American (Muslim) businessman and father of four who chose to remain in New Orleans to protect his property, despite his wife, Kathy (an American who converted to Islam), repeatedly urging him to leave to join her and the kids, as the warnings of Hurricane Katrina’s intensity moved from Category 1, then 2 to finally Category 5.

Zeitoun tells Kathy and Abdulrahman’s poignant story and the life they’d created in New Orleans before and after Katrina. Zeitoun is a well-known successful painting contractor in his neighbourhood of New Orleans. He and Kathy worked hard to build their business and had invested in property to support their children’s college education. In general, life was going well.

Then, in September 2005, Katrina tore through the city. The levees broke and flooded the city with water. Zeitoun paddles in his aluminium canoe through the streets of his neighbourhood. He decides he can make good of the situation by helping others where he can.

He manages to find a phone that works in one of his properties and speaks with Kathy each day. Then, on 6 September, 2005, Kathy doesn’t get his call and the story of what happened to Zeitoun unfolds.

I remember the new reports we received on television and I can’t help but think now that these could not compare to the horrors this man of dignity endured at the hands of his own government.

Eggers is masterful in being able to intermingle the tightrope of suspense with just enough information to stoke up some strong emotion – well, he did for me anyway.

I’d be interested to hear from other readers if you have read this book. What are your thoughts on how this could happen in America, the supposed ‘land of the free’?

Fight Club – What synonyms would you use to search this title?

Tags

Brad Pitt, David Fincher, Edward Norton, Fight Club, Helena Bonham Carter, Masculinity

Fight Club, the 1999 film, directed by David Fincher and starring Edward Norton, Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham Carter, was adapted from the 1996 novel written by Chuck Palahniuk.

The film and the book are based on an organisation known as “Fight Club” – an entity that enables men to vent aggression physically by fighting an opponent in the ring.

The main protagonist is a nameless narrator (Edward Norton) in the film but, in the book, the character is identified as Jack. This guy is an American male discontented with his white-collar job – his ‘place’ in American society. He suffers from insomnia and visits his doctor to get medication in a bid to relieve the sleeplessness, which the doctor refuses to do. Instead, the doctor advises him to go to a support group (for testicular cancer victims) to witness more severe suffering than his (and perhaps, as bid to get him in touch with his feelings). He becomes addicted to attending these support groups as he pretends to be a victim. He meets Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter) and strikes up a friendship.

Whilst on a business trip, our nameless protagonist (the ‘narrator’) meets Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) and has cause to call Tyler when he returns home and finds his apartment had been destroyed by an explosion. They meet in a bar, have a chat over drinks, which leads to Tyler inviting the narrator to stay at his place. Outside the bar, Tyler asks the narrator to hit him – they engage in a fist fight. The narrator decides to move in with Tyler irrespective of the fight that took place. They continue to have further fights outside the bar and these skirmishes attract other men to crowd around to watch and egg the fighters on. This is the beginning of a “fight club”, which takes place in the bar’s basement.

So, the story continues with Tyler and Marla becoming sexually involved, more fight clubs (called “Project Mayhem”, also known as an anti-materialist and anti-corporate organisation) formed across the country under Tyler’s leadership. The narrator wants to be more involved in the organisation but then, Tyler suddenly disappears as the twists and turns in the storyline play out.

The film portrays a man’s need to be in control of his own life –

“He’s tried to do everything he was taught to do, tried to fit into the world by becoming the thing he isn’t”.

The narrator creates the persona of Tyler. He is unhappy, confused and enraged and looks for a way to change his life. He begins to embody two personas – his own and that of Tyler. He finds it difficult to deal with the complexities of the human condition – with its complicated mix of strengths and frailties, tempered by idealistic views, fuelled by the media, of who we think we are or we’d like to be whilst trying to learn the lessons of compromise and accepting who we are with the good, the bad and the ugly.

At some point in most people’s lives, this dichotomy between our idealistic selves and our real selves is resolved in some form of self-acceptance or through the process of ‘maturity’. But for others, these complexities and complications in human life cannot be reconciled, particularly when the concept of youth and all that it represents is threatened and there isn’t a compelling alternative to bridge the abyss between youth and old age.

The narrator isn’t aware of his alter-ego creation, Tyler Durben, who he mentally projects in the film, Fight Club.

Fight Club represents modern man’s need for feeling masculine and humanly powerful in a world where personal power is annihilated or dehumanised. In the end, the narrator accepts maturity as he accepts the middle ground between his two conflicting selves, which is the best any of us can really hope for.

How many synonyms could you use to search for alternatives on the following keywords?

Fight, fighting

Violence

Dichotomy

Power

What keywords would you use to search for films on masculinity and power?

What other synonyms might you use in this search?

Latest Read – ‘The Girl Who Played With Fire’ by Stieg Larsson

Tags

Lisbeth Salander, Mikael Blomkvist, Stieg Larsson, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, The Girl Who Played With Fire, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

This is the second book in a trilogy written by Stieg Larsson. Set in Sweden, the novel revolves around a skinny, smart, streetwise, introverted girl with a photographic memory (Lisbeth Salander) and a personable, dogmatic journalist (Mikeal Blomkvist) who had met and worked together in book one, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

Continuing the Salander/Blomkvist story, The Girl Who Played With Fire, amps up the sequence of nail-biting, seat-gripping adventures and misadventures as Salander is accused of three murders. Although, there are people on her side, Blomkvist, for one, circumstantial evidence uncovered by the police puts Salander in the frame.

As Larsson’s plot unravels, it becomes clear that there is more to the narrative than at first meets the eye. The complexity of the story is interwoven superbly, picking up on threads from his first novel, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, taking the tale to new levels and keeping the reader guessing what will happen next. Larsson is clever in the way that he doesn’t cease to amaze with a sophisticated storyline. Yet he really did pad out the some of the mundane activities of the character’s everyday life to give the reader a sense of reality (although, I thought at times, Larsson could have left out some of these details).

The novel culminates in a cliff-hanger, which, no doubt, crescendos in the final book in Larsson’s trilogy, The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest.

I can’t wait to read this one to find out what happens!

Latest Read – ‘The Egg and I’ by Betty MacDonald

Tags

Betty Macdonald, country life, Olympic Peninsula, The Egg and I

This book was delightfully hilarious. A little pearler, even if politically incorrect by today’s standards!

Published in 1945, The Egg and I, written by Betty Macdonald, was the tale of a new bride who obliged (or should it be, humoured) her husband (as women did in those days), to fulfil his dream of chicken ranching.

The novel set in the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State, United States, was written from the author’s experience of country life without electricity or mod-cons, raising, feeding and plucking chickens as well as taking care of the household tasks (without Internet, telephones, television, washing machines, dishwashers, coffee makers or other electrical gadgets we count as “necessities” today), tending the garden and orchard, canning the home-grown fruits and vegetables, helping hubby with endless tasks he had an innate knack for and that she blundered her way through – all whilst living in the embrace of haughty, impersonal mountains and isolated by some miles from other people. How many people today could live this life?

Imagine a world without phones?

MacDonald describes the chores she must deal with each day (starting at 4:00am), the wildlife (bears, coyotes and pumas), the Indians, country life and the people in it such as the Hicks’ and the Kettles. It was just plain exhausting reading about it.

Reading this book brought back some lovely memories for me.

MacDonald’s descriptions of the mountains looming in the background, veiled in mist, reminded me of a time when I was young and spent school holidays on my friend’s parent’s farm in the ‘mountains’ (the mountains in Australia are mere hills compared to those in the States or Europe), when the mornings were cold and misty, the wind blew through the pine trees that lined the back fence of the house, creating a whispering, eerie sound which reminded me it was cold outside and we were relatively isolated. I remember it was a little scary at night time, though. Watching the sun rise over the mountains – it was a sight I never grew tired of.

Chores in the country are a part of life, even for children. My friend and her brother were expected to help with the milking every morning, collect eggs, feed the ‘chooks’ and ducks as part of the daily routine. It was, of course, a lot of fun when we shared these chores – it was a good time for my friend and I to discuss secret-girl’s business, talk about boys, what we were wearing to the next dance, school and what we were going to do in life. It was also a time that I fell in love for the first time – with her brother!

Of course I had similar tasks to do at home. But it was a lot more fun with friends. We made fun while we worked. My friend’s family all worked hard. It was a part of their in-built ethos but not all farmers are made of the same stuff. This aspect was also pointed out in Macdonald’s novel.

As I read the book, I also glimpsed enjoyable memories spending time with my brother and nieces at my brother’s house in the country. Getting up at the break of day when it’s really chilly outside, yet toasty-warm inside, listening to the crackling sounds of the wood fire as the new kindling starts to burn, cooking breakfast and leisurely eating and talking with others (instead of a solitary meal gulped down before rushing off to work or other city-living necessities), working physically hard through the day weeding gardens, clipping edges, cooking and enjoying fresh produce with family, cleaning and chopping wood for the fire to keep us warm that night –all makes for a memorable existence. To be honest, here in the city, sometimes one day rolls into the next – it’s hardly memorable. The hard physical work induced a few muscular aches and pains, which actually felt good in a way that you know you are alive and part of life.

‘The Egg and I’ was a sheer pleasure to read. I can’t remember the last time I laughed reading a book. The book provided the basis for the comedy movies Ma and Pa Kettle in the 1940s and 1950s, which later came to television.

Who’s in charge now?

Tags

cyberbullies, cyberspace, digital literacy, Sydney Morning Herald

The United States of America seems to openly and proudly showcase its social dysfunction. It doesn’t even realise the depths of social dysfunction – since it has pretty well become ‘the norm’. Its young people seem to be on the wrong track with school shooting massacres and cyberbully-induced suicides, it seems that what was once a clear distinction between right or wrong, has blurred along with the rest of the world.

Caring for others now seems to be a concept relegated to the history books – a nostalgic fairytale of ‘once-upon-a-time’ when people used to be civilised and ‘did unto others as they would have done unto them’.

Is this a Darwinian quest of survival of the fittest? Or are we returning to barbaric behaviour in a quest to outperform, outstrip, outshine and outdo other humans, perceived as competitors rather than companions, to covet a Holy Grail of leader of the cyberpack?

Recently, in the Sydney Morning Herald, 26 July 2010, an article written by Jan Hoffman, in the Education section, caught my interest. This article pointed out that US schools are in the spotlight on the issue of confronting and managing cyberbullying.

No doubt, this is a prickly area. The scary part, and Hoffman’s article illustrated this well, is that the parents of vicious, teenage perpetrators are sticking their heads in the sand and expecting schools to come up with the artillerty to tackle cyberbullying.

Surely, this is a community problem? What values do society (parents, media and other institutions) convey as being acceptable? Perhaps, we are all becoming desensitised robots? Or, is the job of raising children left to cyber-nanny or media mommy? Where does responsibility lay?

The irony is that parents ‘are looking to schools for justice, protection, even revenge’ (SMH, 26 July 2010) but the poor, old educators (there to provide children with an education and let’s face it, these days, the curriculum hasn’t quite caught up with social change) are left fumbling in the dark on how to deal with some of these taxing situations.

The long arm of the law also still seems to be grappling with what to do in relation to the issue of cyberbullying and cyberbullies (even though they may be minors with lethal intent). There is little in the way of precedents. It seems that legally, ethically and morally, society is still working it out. Where does this leave the victims? What of the perpetrators? Where does this leave modern society?

Hoffman proposed that US schools are required to play detective to ‘placate parents’ but the fact remains, as she clearly pointed out, that the education system is having a hard time trying to cope with ‘the dilemmas presented by the Internet, mobile phones and social networking sites’ (SMH, 26 July).

On a broader scale, educators are probably having a difficult time in keeping up with the technological developmental stages young people transit these days. Youngsters, who cut their (milk) teeth on digital technology in primary school are, no doubt, quite technologically sophisticated and savvy by high school (as Hoffman pointed out). Most young teachers probably don’t have the same level of technological sophistication that some of their students have and that leaves educators in a vulnerable position – authoritatively and legally.

In the United States, getting out of trouble is relatively easy if the accused has the means – by simply and neatly, taking legal action. Hoffman’s article mentioned that ‘a few families have successfully sued schools for failing to protect their children from bullies’ (26 July, 2010). Of course, each case has its technicalities on which a ruling can be substantiated.

But, do the bullies actually give a toss? Do they actually learn there can be enforceable consequences to their acts of meanness or uncivil behaviour?

I think not.

These same characters probably grow up to bully their way through life and probably, a lot of them are very successful – success that can be measured in terms of power and material possessions. It seems that despite the global reach of digital technology, cyberspace has illustrated regressive rather than progressive human behaviour in developing youth.

What does the future hold for these adults and society?

Latest Read – ‘The Glass Room’ by Simon Mawer

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Simon Mawer, The Glass Room

The story of ‘The Glass Room’ (der Glasraum) by Simon Mawer, begins in Venice, in 1929, when Viktor Laudauer (a Jewish entrepreneuer who owns Landauer Motor Cars) and his lovely German wife, Liesel, are on their honeymoon and meet Rainer von Abt.

von Abt is an architect who builds the Landauers a house of extravagant proportions, one that embraces modernist architectural design and showcases the decadence of the time with a glass wall on its south side, chrome columns, a caramel-coloured onyx wall marbled with white lines, travertine floors, Rosewood panels, a curved staircase, Macassau wood and a plain white ceiling. It is an abstract building, a house of space and light filled with optimism for the people who inhabit it and those who visit. The house provides the perfect backdrop for ‘… the soft light of detachment and reason’ (Mawer, p. 3).

The story takes the reader through life with the Landauers and their friends as the house is built, during the time Landauers inhabit it until they must flee from the Nazis to seek safety out of Europe, and afterwards, as the house has its own story to tell.

The house is the central character throughout the book.

The real house is called ‘Villa Tugendhat’ and was designed by Ludwig Mies van der Roh in 1930. It is located in Brno in the Czech Republic.

The book was well written, including a few Czech and German words throughout the narrative, which provide an element of authenticity. The events that unravel over thirty years are compellingly credible, even though this story is the creative masterpiece of Mawer. Mawer manages to successfully interweave wartime tales and dates into the narrative to give an impression of a possible reality that could have taken in this house.

Overall, I thought it was a great read with believable characters that brought the story and the house to life.