Craig Rettig.com

Apparently, even Jane Austen would have a hard time getting a novel published today:

David Lassman sent off to 18 publishers assorted chapters from Austen novels in which he changed just the titles and the names of the characters.

Seventeen publishers rejected or ignored his bid for literary glory. Only one spotted the ruse and told him not to mimic Pride and Prejudice so closely.

— Reuters

However, I do find it disconcerting that seventeen of the eighteen publishers didn't recognize (or at least acknowledge) Austen's work.

Depending on which source you use, the average English speaker only has a vocabulary of 2,500–5,000 words. By contrast, William Shakespeare used at least 25,000 different words in his extensive body of work.

Having a good vocabulary helps you communicate more effectively and often more succinctly. Rather than saying "someone who studies the lives and origins of living organisms," you can just use the single term, "biologist." If used without pretension, an expanded vocabulary demonstrates to others your level of intelligence. Here are some simple and fun ways to improve yours:

Read: It's cliché, but the simplest ways are often the best. Reading books that expand your mind, such as nonfiction and classic literature, expose you to all sorts of new words and concepts. Best of all, these titles tend to be free or inexpensive, as you can get them from the library or Project Gutenberg or purchase them in the clearance section of your favorite new or used bookstore. Popular fiction isn't as useful for this, but it's better than nothing.

Crossword Puzzles: I try to do at least one puzzle every day. I'm not a fan of the local newspaper, so I purchase those all-crossword puzzle books in the magazine section of my grocery. These only cost $2–3 and contain 75–100 puzzles, which I find is an excellent value for a two- or three-month supply.

Word Games: Not only can you learn new words, but you get some inexpensive social interaction at the same time. Recommended games include Scrabble, Upwords, or my personal favorite, Quiddler. If you can't find a game group, Quiddler has a solitaire version of play that is quite challenging.

Word of the Day: There are literally dozens of sites with word of the day features, and some of the larger ones have RSS feeds. Set your browser's home page to one of these sites or add their feed to your reader. I have three in my feed reader, which is probably overkill for most people, but I get somewhat obsessive about this at times. Good sites include: A.Word.A.Day, Dictionary.com Word of the Day, and TheFreeDictionary.com.

Dictionary/Thesaurus Roulette: This is the classic game of opening one of these books to a random page and reading down until you encounter a word you don't know. Read the definition or synonym list and commit it to memory. If possible, try to work it into the day's communication at least once.

If you're curious where your vocabulary level is, I've found VocabTest.com has an astounding array of tests for various levels.

Some of you e-mailed about yesterday's article, wanting Franklin's exact description, so here it is:

About this time I met with an odd volume of the Spectator. It was the third. I had never before seen any of them. I bought it, read it over and over, and was much delighted with it. I thought the writing excellent, and wished, if possible, to imitate it. With this view I took some of the papers, and, making short hints of the sentiment in each sentence, laid them by a few days, and then, without looking at the book, try'd to compleat the papers again, by expressing each hinted sentiment at length, and as fully as it had been expressed before, in any suitable words that should come to hand. Then I compared my Spectator with the original, discovered some of my faults, and corrected them. But I found I wanted a stock of words, or a readiness in recollecting and using them, which I thought I should have acquired before that time if I had gone on making verses; since the continual occasion for words of the same import, but of different length, to suit the measure, or of different sound for the rhyme, would have laid me under a constant necessity of searching for variety, and also have tended to fix that variety in my mind, and make me master of it. Therefore I took some of the tales and turned them into verse; and, after a time, when I had pretty well forgotten the prose, turned them back again. I also sometimes jumbled my collections of hints into confusion, and after some weeks endeavored to reduce them into the best order, before I began to form the full sentences and compleat the paper. This was to teach me method in the arrangement of thoughts. By comparing my work afterwards with the original, I discovered many faults and amended them; but I sometimes had the pleasure of fancying that, in certain particulars of small import, I had been lucky enough to improve the method or the language, and this encouraged me to think I might possibly in time come to be a tolerable English writer, of which I was extremely ambitious.

— Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

Today I started reading The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and came across the method he used to learn how to write better, which I thought was ingenious.

• Take a short piece of writing you find to be particularly eloquent, moving, and/or persuasive.
• On a blank sheet of paper, take notes about each sentence or paragraph, expressing the sentiment and tone of the passage.
• Put the original writing and your notes away for a day or two.
• Take out your sheet of notes and attempt to recreate the writing.
• Once you've finished, bring back the original and compare it side-by-side with your attempted reproduction.
• Note where the differences are and of the differing passages, determine if the original's or yours are better and determine why.
• Repeat with different types of writing until you're constantly producing well-written pieces.

This seems like a great way to learn copywriting. I'm going to raid my swipe file and try this experiment over the next week or so. I imagine it will be tedious, but if it works, it will be well worth the effort.

If you haven't seen this linked from other sites yet, Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert) posted the following article to his blog: The Day You Became A Better Writer. If you haven't read it yet, I encourage you to do so.

The main point of the article is simplifying your writing. I know this is one area where I have problems. Two of my worst habits are using complex sentence structures and active vs. passive voice.

Complex Sentence Structures:

Ugh: Dr. Sinister looked over Bobby and Jane and snapped his fingers, pointing at the two of them. Immediately, they were both grabbed by two men each, while two more jumped beside Dr. Sinister with their weapons drawn.

I'm embarrassed to admit I wrote that mess. This is a cut-and-dry case of trying to do too much in too few sentences. The above could easily be broken into five or more sentences and be more readable. As it stands, that paragraph is borderline painful to read.

Active vs. Passive Voice:

This is a misuse (or overuse) of the word "was". For example:

Passive: The steak was eaten by Frank.
Active: Frank ate the steak.

Both sentences say the same thing. However, you can plainly see the Active version is both shorter and quicker to comprehend.

I think I began doing this because I'm a programmer, and I tend to see this in other programmers' writing as well. As programmers, we're often given the end result and have to work backwards. Even if we're starting at the very beginning of a program, we have to constantly keep the end result in mind. Consequently, when constructing sentences, we consider the object before the subject.

Hopefully, Scott's article gives you a few ideas about how to improve your writing. I know I'm going to be more conscious of my structure and voice in the future.