Writing Effectively With Short Sentences
In general, readers of all sorts are repulsed by what is usually known as a verbal hemorrhage on the page. Long sentences, often perfectly legitimate, valid and grammatically immaculate, often give readers a roller-coaster feeling due to the illegibility of the subject matter in question. Verbosity is not something that writers can be proud of. They must keep away from it like it was a virus. Here is a 72- worder sentence from a document written by a consultant about improving an city area:
In general, readers of all sorts are repulsed by what is usually known as a verbal hemorrhage on the page. Long sentences, often perfectly legitimate, valid and grammatically immaculate, often give readers a roller-coaster feeling due to the illegibility of the subject matter in question. Verbosity is not something that writers can be proud of. They must keep away from it like it was a virus. Here is a 72- worder sentence from a document written by a consultant about improving an city area:
At one level, the sentence is quite easy to read – most of the verbs and nouns are reasonably simple and palatable. What makes it hard work is its length, with so many points jostling together for importance at once.
Long sentences give the reader too much information to cope up with. Unless they are simply constructed, they become the cause of severe confusion due to their demand on the readers’ attention, effort and short-term memory. It is usually a best practice to emphasize one main point, and additionally one subsidiary point in a sentence. Anything more than that would be hard work for the reader. Using this approach, perhaps the above text could be reduced to around 50 words spread across three sentences, without any loss of meaning and greatly amplifying readability and clarity of information.
Not many people want to inhabit Ramaiah Riverside complex, as the area has been disfigured by demolition. The population has further dropped since the houses have been unoccupied or empty. These problems, in addition to the low purchasing power of the residents, have badly affected businesses like shops and malls.
What is the ideal length of a sentence? It is a tricky question and any guideline prescribing to strictly adhere to an upper limit will only make matters worse. As a rule of thumb, any sentence over 40 words will wear down and deter the readers. An average of 15 to 20 words is a generally considered good enough. The key word here is average, so not all sentences need to be in this range; there should be variety as well. Short sentences can add a lot of punch as well. However, beware of many short sentences in succession, as they may look tacky and as a compromise in your style of writing. There is no lower limit on a sentence length. A well placed “Why not?” can be the most effective sentence in your writing.
One reason for keeping to a 15 to 20 words average is that people are used to it. With the advent of social media messaging, people are getting used to more and more context sensitive meanings being packed into shorter and shorter sentences. Formal and official writing are still somewhat lengthier than social messaging. Yet the general trend toward which people are gravitating in the current generation is towards crispness.
Here are some of the tips and techniques to write meaningfully, impactfully and crisply without compromising on the information being shared.
Split and disconnect
Full stops enable readers the luxury of a break in their mental activity and prepare them for the next nugget of information. Whenever there are too many conjunctions and joining phrases (“and”, “but”, ”however”, ”though”, “as”, “since”) in your writing, consider splitting up the sentences, disconnect them and form a new sentence. Brevity helps.
For example, the following is one rambling 67 word sentence.
I understand that some physicians making night calls have been stopped and searched in the recent past by the police on suspicion that they might be carrying drugs and their caution while visiting certain localities in the north of the city has been extremely exhausting and has even included telephoning the address to be visited from their car when they arrive outside the residence of the patient.
Here, although there are a lot of conjunctions, the main idea is to split based on the break in the meaning. It comes in the second line after “drugs”, where the writer starts talking about caution. So, we can split it here and re-write in the following manner
I understand that some physicians making night calls have been stopped in the recent past on the suspicions that they were carrying drugs. Their caution while visiting certain localities in the north of the city has been very thorough. It has even included telephoning the address to be visited from their car when they arrive at the residence.
Now, the whole idea of the paragraphs can be grasped in the first reading.
Split and connect
A long rambling sentence must be split into smaller, easily digestible sentences. This sometimes also means putting a full stop and starting a new sentence with a connecting word. The connecting terms can be Additionally, Also, Alternatively, And, As a result, Because, But, Consequently, Despite this, Even so, Further, Furthermore, Indeed, In other words, In the next few days, Moreover, Nevertheless, Now, Or, Otherwise, So, Therefore, Today, Yet and so on.
Consider this long winding 92 word sentence that offers multiple bits of information in one breath. This is perfectly legible grammatically, but about 5 times over the prescribed average word limit.
While it is appalling to see the stray dogs of the localities in the city outskirts attack and injure pedestrians and two-wheel riders, the apathy and negligence of the council members in addressing this plague of stray dogs has been no less than shocking, given the fact that many of the sitting council members had promised in their election manifesto a complete stop to the nuisance of garbage piling in the city outskirts which is the primary cause for an explosion in the stray dog population over the last couple of years.
Brevity and clarity can be achieved by splitting the sentence into multiple shorter sentences and with the use of the connecting words.
It is appalling to see stray dogs attack and injure pedestrians and two-wheel riders in the localities in the outskirts of the city. However, what is shocking is the apathy and negligence of the council members in addressing this plague of stray dogs. Now, many of the sitting council members had in their election manifesto promised to stop the nuisance of garbage piling in the localities lying in the city outskirts. Because, garbage piling is the primary cause for the explosion of stray dog population over the last couple of years.
Say less
Sometimes a sentence includes needless repetition either due to negligent writing, or overenthusiasm of the writer.
Watch out for these repetitions and when you sweep-read the writing, catch out these repetitive verbiages and cut them down.
Use a list
Vertical lists can be used to break long sentences into more visual chunks. These are particularly useful when descripting a procedure, a process, a list of varied items etc.
Instead of writing the procedure of preparing coffee in the following way
After boiling water to about 75 degrees C, pour it on to the nicely layered coffee power of the steel filter. Once the boiling water recedes into the lower receptacle of the filter, if you need the decoction to be stronger, repeat the step by pouring it over the coffee power again. Once you are satisfied with the decoction, add milk and sugar for taste.
Try using a list
a. Boil the water to about 75 degrees C
b. Layer coffee power in a steel filter
c. Add boiling water into the filter
d. Once the water is drained into the lower receptacle, check the decoction strength.
e. If more strength is needed, repeat step c and d again.
f. Add milk and sugar to taste.
Cut Verbiage
Sometimes, the main idea of a paragraph can be completely obscured by the sheer verbiage and the vocabulary richness of the writer.
Consider the following example. It is inordinately verbose, too long at 105 words and too repetitive for such an important message to be shared.
The organizers of the gala event must strive for greater security and safety both from the point of view of ensuring that the campfire itself does not contain any infeasible and unacceptably hazardous and dangerous materials such as aerosols, gels, pressurized tins, alcohol, discarded foam furniture and from the point of view of ensuring the cracking of fireworks in the designated area only, with easily recognizable and identifiable wardens to be available during the gala to prevent folks from indiscriminately letting off fireworks, potentially resulting in a fire catastrophe of a major fire break out and a stampede ensuing from the running gala event attendees.
Putting into practice all we have learnt, the same can be re-written using split, disconnect and list techniques as follows
The event organizers must try to achieve greater safety by ensuring that:
a. The campfire does not contain any dangerous materials such as pressurized cans or foam furniture
b. Fireworks are let off only in the designated area, and
c. Easily identifiable wardens are present to stop people letting off their own fireworks
Start afresh
It is often easier to scratch and start afresh when a long winded and unwieldy sentence that has been formed out of a writer’s imagination cannot be made easily readable. When a writer encounters a situation in which he has written a 100 word sentence with multiple ideas, verbose phrases, emphasis on multiple key points to relay important information, it is often not easy to re-work on the sentence. That is when he has to completely rewrite with all the techniques elaborated above right from the beginning.