Some people dance to express themselves, others play music, even others paint; I write. Many people have said they like my writing style, and even more have asked me to edit and check their texts for errors and clarity. Studying English Literature and Linguistics taught me all about structured, well-organized texts and heavily influenced my Sinology papers. Moreover, I learned a great deal through my radio work, there’s only so much you can say aloud until your breath runs out.

Writing is a learnable skill - like programming, it requires a couple of basic rules and lots of practice. Because I repeatedly hand out the same tips after editing (aka best practices), I list them here for even more people to use. The main target language here is German, but much of it also applies to English.

Write to Be Understood

Verbs spark joy: German likes nouns, creating monster sentences that are hard to understand (Nominalisierungen / Beamtendeutsch). Verbs bring color to any sentence and get sad if you only prefer nouns combined with simple verbs (make, do, get / tun, machen, können). Think of the verbs, create rainbows! For German sentence horrors, see Wolf Schneider in the resources section.

Simple is better than complex: Prefer main clauses (Hauptsätze), use sub-clauses sparingly (Nebensätze). German allows very complex sub-clauses, to the point that they become hard-to-decode mazes (verschachtelte Nebensätze). There’s no need to emulate Immanuel Kant. Nothing clouds understanding more than several sub-clauses separating a verb, and the sentence ends with a sad, dangling verb part that has forgotten about its peer. Here’s what I mean: “Wir trennten das Erbe, das aus einem Haus, einer Katze und einem Schrebergarten bestand, der in den 40er-Jahren [insert long story about Schrebergarten], auf.” No.

“Wir trennten das Erbe auf. Es bestand aus… “.

Get moving, be active! It’s easy to write in passive voice, but active voice yields easier reading. Writing in active voice does not force the reader to think about who actually did what. “The bug was reported to the company”: Who found the bug? “The researcher reported the bug to the company.” Ah, the researcher, not some exterminator.

Concrete is better than abstract: This is the most important radio rule, with people listening instead of reading. A concrete example or a sentence that describes something concrete always beats the lone abstract description. “They had many arguments about the budget”. Okay. “The CEO smacked the table while her CFO hid behind the laptop.” Aha! Writing is like drawing an image, the more concrete your words are, the more people will imagine and relate to the content.

Start simple, expand to complex: Start each paragraph with a short introductory sentence, after which you dive into complex depths, and then finish it off with a summarizing sentence. Each paragraph covers one topic. This structure guides the reader through what you want to say. See the writing guide by the University of Zurich linked below for details (appendix).

You’re smart, no need to show it off: Someone told me, “If I don’t use fancy words and complicated structures, everyone will think I’m dumb.” The goal of writing is not to show off your special knowledge or your vast Oxford vocabulary. The goal is to be understood and make your point - and write for your audience (not for yourself). If your audience is made up of doctors, please use all the fancy Latin words to discuss the human body. If they are laypeople, use everyday language. Also, think of radio: When you have 2:30 minutes to tell your story, there’s no space for empty words.

In terms of this blog vs. audience and writing, readers need to apply their own judgment. I determined this to be my creative writing space, so feel free to browse elsewhere if the sewing or IT vocabulary is too overwhelming :)

Get Started and Color Your Text

The blank page scares us all. Here’s some tips I use myself:

Try to formulate in one sentence what you want to write. Say it aloud, as if you were shouting it to someone else in another room (the “kitchen call”, or “Küchenzuruf”). Your computer will hear.
Speaking aloud always helps. I repeatedly read aloud what I write (see: radio work) to hear if a sentence works or not, even these blog posts.
Write all headers in a document to create a structure, fill in notes in appropriate places, then edit and write them properly.
Imagine the audience while writing or a special person that might appreciate what you write.
If you’ve written a text, go over it again and try to reduce it to the max by “killing your darlings”.

Here’s for some color in your text:

People will remember your text if it’s well-written, even more so if you use rhetorical structures to spice it up. Alliterations, pars pro toto, word play - there’s a reason advertising phrases stick with us for years ("Mit Ovi chasches nöd besser, aber länger” - Antithesis). Just use them sparingly like salt, to not fall into clichés and empty idioms.
Create “Hinhörer” by inventing new words or phrases. I did not find a fitting English translation, but a “Hinhörer” generally has someone prick up their ears to listen (see: radio work).
Drawing metaphors (and the like, i.e. metonymy and allegories) can work like a “Hinhörer”, illustrating a concept for the sake of clarity. I recently heard that generative AI is like a street lamp: It illuminates just a particular spot, and we’re looking at it utterly captivated by what it highlights, while overlooking everything else in the darkness. The imagery was so strong it stuck. I heard it in a Swiss German interview with Matthias Zehnder, a media scholar. He credits Paul Watzlawick in a blog post.

Resources for Better (German) Writing

Writing English: Clark, Roy Peter: “Writing Tools: 55 Essential Strategies for Every Writer.” Little, Brown Spark, 2016 (2006). This is like an expanded version of the section “Write to Be Understood”.

“Literature Guide. Essay Writing, Research, Presentations” (2022), English Department University of Zurich. PDF document, general link

Writing German: Heuer, Walter et al.: «Richtiges Deutsch», NZZ Libro, 2021, 33rd ed.

Commas and other cases of doubt: Duden: «Das Wörterbuch der sprachlichen Zweifelsfälle: Richtiges und gutes Deutsch», Duden, Band 12. Remedy for all your comma woes and more.

Fun with bad German: Schneider, Wolf: “Deutsch fürs Leben. Was die Schule zu lehren vergass”, Rowohlt Taschenbuch, 24th ed.

Narratology: Rimmon-Kenan, Shlomith: “Narrative Fiction. Contemporary Poetics”, Taylor & Francis, 2002, 2nd ed. We read this in our introductory classes of English Literature, it basically teaches you all the tricks how stories are told , tricks you can use in your own writing and presentations. There’s probably a newer edition now or an update.

All the nice alternatives to boring words (German): Wortschatz Uni Leipzig

Everything is Alive Podcast: https://www.everythingisalive.com/ Change of perspective with a podcast that interviews objects. Louis, Can of Soda, and Maeve, Lamp Post, are good starters.

Update 2024-12-22: Added Roy Peter Clark’s “Writing Tools”.

Image source: “a water source of fountain pens”, Nightcafe/Dall-E.

Last modified on 2023-12-21