Saturday, April 26, 2008

What is good writing?

Blogging Blackmail

It seems as if good writing were the result of lots of practice and hard work, not necessarily a gift we are born with, although there will be some who have a well developed verbal ability or a sort of linguistic intelligence. But if one is willing to work and practice regularly, writing will come along naturally. As the saying goes "Practice makes perfect".

Putting words into paper or screen everyday will definitely make us better writers and as we gain confidence, our skills get sharpened and our satisfaction grows as we see much better products of our efforts, don´t you think?

So what makes a piece of writing good? Let´s see what your thoughts are on this then ...

4 comments:

Berta said...

OK ....nothing here yet. I hope you start writing and sharing your brief reflections soon ;)

Anonymous said...

I think that a good writing should be understandable for the people who is going to read it. For example an article from a scientific magazine should be made according to the topic and also it should be objective while an article published in a fashion magazine for sure will be more subjective and is a totally different kind of reading. My opinion is that we should think a little bit about what do we want to write and then make a good text based on the ideas of how to write well, doing drafts and revisions before the final text is done.

Berta said...

I see you have given priority to audience as a way of focusing writing, an aspect which is of key importance and will certainly help the people who ARE going to read the text.
Thinking about what WE WANT to write before actually putting words down on paper is one strategy. Writing directly without thinking much is another, but it needs many more revisions than the first as some of the ideas might be out of place. I use both, depending on the allowed time and the requirements to complete a task.
Let´s see what others have to say, eh?

Anonymous said...

Good Writing

Reaching this state of being able to write out of nowhere, with no problems, and hardly any thoughts, is coveted, yet not easy, I'm pretty sure no one does it anyways, everyone has to put at least some effort writing, the most notable and important idea would be to keep a mental note, a mental map of what we're going to write about, everyone already does this, we just have to polish it, to make it all better, and re-read our writing after we're done, just to check for mistakes, things that can be changed, so our texts make more sense to us, and to our readers.

A good point to keep in mind is

"There is no successful writer who does not plan his work before he starts writing — and if he says he does, he’s lying." From http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/advice-for-students-10-steps-toward-better-writing.html

That's the most important thing in my opinion, plan everything out, even if it's just in your mind, no draft needed.