January 25, 2001
Writing, good, bad or indifferent - THE COMMENTARY
By Joseph Planta
= Before the main Commentary: As you all know, Survivor 2, will air Thursday nights opposite NBC’s powerhouse Friends. NBC announced a week and a half ago that episodes of Friends would be expanded to 40 minutes. (33 minutes, in actuality as advertisements are included.) To fill the 8 o’clock hour, NBC decided that Saturday Night Live would do live skits to the top of the hour, opening up 9 o’clock with Will and Grace. I have learned today, however that with Friends ending at 8:40, Will and Grace shall air directly after for a 40 minute segment too and then Just Shoot Me, the regularly scheduled 9:30 sitcom, will air instead at 9:20. No word on SNL and where it fits in the equation. I think that they’ve scuttled those plans. This is a masterful move on the network’s part, however will cause a headache for fans and yet-to-be fans when these shows go into syndication.
The Canadian part to the story is that Global, owns the rights to both shows. Thus it was in a quandry as to which show to air at 8:00 Thursdays: Friends or Survivor 2. Well, their plan now is to air Survivor at 8:00, while Friends in the 7:00 hour. It’s most confusing, as 7:00 isn’t really primetime. At least Canadians will get both fixes, but further indication that Global is betting on Survivor 2 as being the winner in the battle of the 2000-2001 season: Friends vs. Survivor.
VANCOUVER -- Three questions have hit my e-mail: 1. What makes up good writing? 2. How does this influence the way you write? 3. What are things you still need to learn or improve upon when you write?
Answers, I transmit forthwith...
1. Good writing is good for the soul. What makes it good? Well, if the author is sincere - so much the better. We all have antennae that tell us what’s good and what’s bad. It comes with the territory, that what I consider good is not considered the same by the next guy. For me, I consider something good when the piece, after consumption, makes me think. If I find myself pensive following reading, one sure as hell can bet that its had some sort of impact. The writing I consume is mainly of a non-fiction ilk. (I’m beginning to open up to fiction, albeit very slowly and very recently.) I enjoy the political writings of Allan Fotheringham, because he can use mere words and scatter them about the page in a way that is challenging and funny. The works of Vaughn Palmer in the Vancouver Sun, are admirable in that they are well researched and fair. Both impart their views in their prose, but allow for room for the reader to be their own judge. Neil Simon, the playwright, has written some of my most favourite pieces. They are works of fiction, yet they have something very real about them. They sure as hell don’t feature robots or wizards in supporting parts, which is heartening.
2. I guess consciously (or not) everything I read has had impact on how and what I write. When I do my column, the topic may have been derived from a news story I must have read or seen in the news of the day. The style of composing my thoughts, probably is the same in derivation. I have a great admiration for Jeff Greenfield. Greenfield, is a senior analyst for CNN. He speaks as though he is writing, and whatever that is, is sure as hell well written. (He also happens to be one of the smartest people living, but that’s another story.) Anyways Greenfield, a television personality, talks. I like the way it is composed, so when composing my own - whether it in writing or in speech, if it is appropriate, I emulate. Now to the virgin of thinking, that may sound like plagiarism, but hopefully my own writing has a voice of its own. I do not dare and steal from Fotheringham, Greenfield, Neil Simon or others, but they do have an inherent influence. I think we all are influenced. We are not the first to roam the earth, thus after Adam and Eve, we must all footnote every instance and every reference.
3. Well, in my case I must learn a hell of a lot more. Writing a column, first 5 times now thrice-a-week, (besides amassing four volumes of text) has afforded me a chance to look at my writing critically. I do not write perfectly, nor will I ever. However improvement is always the key. People never stop learning and I think once I drop dead, I’ll have written better than I do now and certainly the improvement is noticeable from the first time I put paper to pen. Or not. I’ve gone through English instruction since kindergarten through to grade 12 (and taking a standard college course right now). I’ve learned things, yet I couldn’t give you the technical definition of a preposition or when or not to use a semi-colon. I just practice, what seems to me, as a reader, as writing.
In the English course I’m taking right now at Langara College; the instructor made us buy a book entitulated Rules of Thumb. It’s a most useful book especially at this level, when the good doctor has no time to teach us the method to which one notices if they are in the correct tense or not. I mention it, because at times it pretends to be a sort of guide that one should use when practising the art of writing. It is, but only in terms of technicalities. A guide that is most useful (albeit in my type of writing) is George Orwell’s Politics and the English Language. It’s an essay that is most useful as it outlines some very good “rules” as to how to compose something coherent. (The legendary Sander Vancour, implicitly states that it is required reading for anyone thinking of the journalism trade.) Those six rules are:
1. Never use a metaphor, similes, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word when a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything barbarous.
I guess like jelly beans, certain writing is good only to certain people, while bad writing is the same. Writing is something that is evolving. Good, bad or indifferent, it matters only to the author. The reader may have his or her own views; the author may consider those views, but generally the prose is laid to rest and that’s the end of the discussion.
Questions and comments may be sent to: editor@thecommentary.ca
An archive of Joseph Planta's previous columns can be found by clicking HERE .