What Would Papa Say?

One of the lasting benefits of attending an Ann Wylie class is receiving her newsletter. It's full of helpful tips and practical advice, whether you’re writing for a start-up or you're immersed in corporate communications. Ann also lets her readers know about online writing tools she deems worthy, so we don't have to fall down the rabbit hole.

Thanks to Ms. Wylie, I've been playing around with the Hemingway app. This simple tool helps make your writing bold and clear by pointing out overly-complex sentences, passive voice, and adverb use. It also shows a readability score. Since discovering the Flesch-Kincaid grade level element in the readability stats in Word, I've always aimed for 10 or higher. I won't deny a smug satisfaction when a first draft comes in around 12.4. As it turns out, that's not a good thing if you want your readers to understand your piece.

I could rant about the decline of our collective IQ, and how the reading level of the average daily newspaper has dropped over the past several years. But the point of writing is clear, effective communication. The reader shouldn't have to work to understand the piece. If that means writing at a sixth grade reading level, so be it. Duh. But that's one of those things it's taken me a while to figure out. And yes, I did run this piece through the app. No adverbs, passive voice, or complex words. I got dinged for a few sentences that are "hard to read," no doubt due to the length. Hemingway and I will have to agree to disagree on that one. Short, punchy sentences do grab a reader's attention, but I'm a fan of an occasional longer sentence in the mix.

So as my writing worlds converge—day gig, freelance, and my own work—it's nice to have a few beacons to guide me no matter what I'm writing. And the point, of course, it to keep writing. Without delusions of "making it." Hemingway said it best. "We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master."