WRITAMINS™

These writing supplements from WORKTALK will boost your ability to write more quickly and concisely.

View the Writamins

Complex Ideas Demand Simple Expression

You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat.
Albert Einstein

The Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman was once asked to review an introductory physics book that had been written by a colleague. Feynman commented to the author that the book had not fully explained a particular physics concept. “That is too hard for freshman students to understand,” said the author. Feynman replied, “If you can’t explain it so that a freshman could understand it, then you don’t understand it.”

Writers often maintain that difficult subjects require difficult language. In fact, even the most difficult subjects can be expressed in clear and simple language. In fact, the more difficult your subject matter, the more simple and straightforward your language should be. By using simpler language for complex subject matter, you minimize the net difficulty for your reader. Here are three ways that you make complex material easier for your reader to understand:

1. Do not use technical terms or jargon.
The jargon is probably the reason that the reader couldn’t understand you in the first place.

2. Write sentences that are no more than 15 words long.
If you have a tough concept to explain, feed it to your reader in small bites.

3. Don’t explain one complex idea in terms of another one.

For example, take a sentence like “Stellar nucleosynthesis of trans-boron elements proceeds under pressure only because of a short resonance of beryllium 8.” How helpful is this explanation going to be to the reader who doesn’t understand “short resonance of beryllium 8”?

When you think that you just CAN’T explain that abstract idea simply, remember this adage

Knowledge is the process of piling up facts; Wisdom lies in their simplification.

Worktalk Communications Consulting can help you communicate powerfully and purposefully. Do you need:

* Web-site content that works?
*Documentation for new procedures?
*Templates for your core correspondence?
* Writing training for your staff?
Call us at (310) 396-8303 to learn how Worktalk can help you get to the point.

Did someone forward this Writamin to you? If you’d like to join the distribution list, email us at lizd@worktalk.com and write “subscribe” in the message box. If you do not wish to receive future Writamins, reply and write “unsubscribe.”

© 2000 Elizabeth Danziger All rights reserved.