William Zinsser: My idol, my hero, my guru

In all the time that I have spent scouring the web for articles that will help us Indians improve our English writing skills, I have not come across any ONE piece that does the job satisfactorily. There are many brilliant how-to's covering different aspects of writing (a few of them have been written about on this blog) but ONE article that discusses all the important aspects? Nah, it does not exist.

At least that's what I thought.

Then I stumbled upon "Writing English as a Second Language" by William Zinsser on The American Scholar website.

Both the headline and the byline convinced me I had hit the jackpot. English is, after all, a second language to most (all?) of us and writing in English does not come easy to many (most?) of us. Who better to explain the intricacies of English and smoothen our path to becoming better writers than the Master himself?

William Zinsser has been my idol since I first read On Writing Well, the definitive guide to writing non-fiction that I recommend to all my students. It's a book you cannot afford not to read even if the writing you have to do at work is minimal. If, however, you are a journalist or work in corporate communications or advertising or PR, this is one of the books you should own so that you can grab hold of it to read every now and then, after you have already devoured it whole once.

"Writing English as a Second Language" is a transcript of a talk given by Zinsser to the incoming international students at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism some three years ago. He begins with a question: What is good writing? His short answer: It depends on what country you’re from.

Zinsser explains why, for instance, Arabic, which is decorative and ornamental, and Spanish, with its long sentences and melodious long nouns, would be the ruin of any journalist trying to write good English. And he then launches into the most fascinating discourse on writing in English that I have ever "heard".

LORD OF THE LANGUAGE: WILLIAM ZINSSER

Zinsser asks: "So what is good English — the language we’re here today to wrestle with?"

And he answers:

It’s not as musical as Spanish, or Italian, or French, or as ornamental as Arabic, or as vibrant as some of your native languages. But I’m hopelessly in love with English because it’s plain and it’s strong. It has a huge vocabulary of words that have precise shades of meaning; there’s no subject, however technical or complex, that can’t be made clear to any reader in good English — if it’s used right. Unfortunately, there are many ways of using it wrong. Those are the damaging habits I want to warn you about today.

Those damaging habits Zinsser is referring to are the habits we have picked up in school and college, habits we may not even be aware of but habits we need to get rid of if we want to become better writers. And the first step in the process involves learning a little bit of the history of English. No, this is not the equivalent of a dull classroom lecture; Zinsser makes it so interesting with modern-day examples and his writing is so fluid that you will read, absorb, and appreciate what he has to say about the Latin and Anglo-Saxon roots of the language.

Zinsser also gives examples of sentences written in bad English and teaches us how to transform them into good English. He provides us with some simple writing tools. And he then outlines, and elaborates on, his four principles of writing good English: Clarity, Simplicity, Brevity, and Humanity.

Read the complete text of William Zinsser's extraordinary speech here: "Writing English as a Second Language".

Now you know why I idolise this great man.

• ALSO READ: "A birthday tribute to the best teacher of writing ever"

• ADDITIONAL READING: "If you're serious about improving your writing skills..."

• EXTERNAL READING: "20 Strategies for Writing in Plain Language", by Mark Nichol, the editor of the very useful Daily Writing Tips blog 

THE GURU
OF WRITING GURUS
IS NO MORE
UPDATE (May 23, 2015): William Zinsser died in New York City on May 12 at the age of 92. Lavish tributes have been paid to him by a host of newspaper and magazine writers:

Corby Kummer in The Atlantic: Remembering Bill Zinsser

Mark Singer in The New Yorker: Tuesdays with Zinsser

The American Scholar, for whom William Zinsser wrote a popular blog, republished one of his seminal pieces: How to Write a Memoir

Laura Fraser in Al Jazeera America: William Zinsser, the man who taught a nation to write well

Douglas Martin in The New York Times: A book that editors and teachers encouraged writers to reread annually

 THE RIGHT STUFF: Commits student Priya Jain, Class of 2017, right after the university exams ended on May 30, 2016, came to tell me that she had bought On Writing Well on my recommendation because she realised during her recent industry internship that good writing skills will be crucial to her success as a media professional.

"Mr Editor, your slips are showing!"

How does a film reviewer and national cultural editor of a leading newspaper react when he is accused — by a blogger, no less — of not knowing how to write in English?

If he is Mayank Shekhar of Hindustan Times, he waffles. Here's an excerpt from a Q&A with Shekhar on the Mumbai Boss website:

Have you have seen this (the critical blog post by Chetna Prakash)?
I’ve heard about it, not seen it. I’m flattered. This particular one I’ve glanced through because it was all over the place and guys in my team showed it to me, but it was a long time back. It comes with the job, especially because I’ve been a columnist and a critic so you have to take a stand, you can’t be sitting on the fence.

But her contention wasn’t that. It was that your English was incorrect.
Yeah, so when [my team] brought it to me, I explained to them what I meant and what this is and that’s very important because you don’t want your team thinking that you don’t know the language for god’s sake. There were a whole lot of things that were puns. Whole lot of stuff, which one could explain pretty easily.

So what did Chetna Prakash write actually? She took Shekhar to task for mangling the English language in his film reviews and she cited examples from his critiques of Peepli Live, We Are Family, and Kites. Study her blow-by-blow job here: The rise and rise of Mayank Shekhar: Or has Sarah Palin found her literary match?

Prakash also poses the question no journalist writing in English wants to be asked:

How can you be one of the most popular film reviewers of India, the national cultural editor of one of the country’s largest selling dailies, and a winner of the Ramnath Goenka Award for Excellence in Journalism — when you have no concept of the English language, your primary tool of trade?

Whoa! That must have hurt. But if you're a senior English-newspaper journalist with a national readership, your writing skills better be up to par. Otherwise, you are just asking for it. As Mayank Shekhar did.

To give credit to Shekhar, though, his responses to questions about the influence of PR professionals on editorial content and about the vexed issue of plagiarism would resonate strongly with any good media professional, especially a journalist.

Here are his views on how to deal with plagiarism:

Would you fire someone whom you knew plagiarised something?
Would I fire someone if it was absolutely proven? Yes.

Has that happened?
In my current job, not a single case of proven plagiarism has been brought to my notice, for which I may have had to fire someone. Which isn’t to suggest that it doesn’t happen, surely it does, and perhaps is even rampant across the board, especially on the Internet, where all information is shared, and is rarely considered sacrosanct enough to merit credit, unfortunately. In my past jobs, whether I have directly fired anyone or not, I have come across instances where an entire interview has been made up and published, without the reporter ever having met or spoken to the person concerned. In such a circumstance, quite obviously, the said reporter has been asked to leave.

• The interview with Mayank Shekhar is part of a series on Mumbai Boss called "Editor's Notes". Read the Q&A with Open magazine's Manu Joseph here. Pay attention especially to Joseph's views on Open's code of ethics.

Chetan Bhagat on how to take your English to the next level

CHETAN BHAGAT

I am not a big fan of Chetan Bhagat's books. 

I have to say this about Bhagat, though — he has got young people reading. That is reason enough to admire him.

He seems to have his finger on the pulse when it comes to knowing the minds of young people and knowing what they like — that is a real gift. And young people seem to identify with him. They seem to like the thought of a best-selling author who writes for them, not for a so-called elite readership.

In this context, advice from Chetan Bhagat on how to improve one's English is sure to be taken seriously by his numerous fans. Which is why The Times of India recently published Bhagat's five tips on how to take your English to the next level. If you think your English skills need polishing, these tips are sure to help:

1. Read something in English you enjoy. People may prescribe classics and you may look good reading them, but if you don't enjoy it, you won't absorb it. Typically, you will enjoy something that is slightly above your current level of English. And if that means comics instead of classics, so be it.

2. Watch English movies with English subtitles. Many TV channels have this now. Listen to the dialogue first. If you can't follow it, read the subtitle. Keep doing this until your dependence on subtitles declines.

3. Spend time with friends, relatives or colleagues who often speak in English. While you may not feel confident enough to keep pace with them, at least you can listen and understand them.

4. Create a group of people whose English is at your level. Meet every week and debate a current topic, making it compulsory to use as much English as possible.

5. Work on your inner confidence. There is a stupid arrogance in people who know English well and they often make fun of people who don't know it. Let that not deter you. Every mistake is a lesson learnt.

Remember, English is not a monster. It is a silly little language that is easier to learn than making good paranthas or driving a car in rush-hour Indian traffic. And once learnt, all the benefits of the globalized world it offers are yours — for life!

Easy-to-practise advice offered in easy-to-understand language. That is the hallmark of Chetan Bhagat's writing. Is it any wonder he is so popular?

• Photo courtesy: Chetan Bhagat's official website