
Writing, Briefly - wumi
http://www.paulgraham.com/writing44.html
======
mark-t
Wow, you managed to find the one remaining page on paulgraham.com that hadn't
been submitted before.

~~~
kirubakaran
I thought I submitted "the one remaining page" when I posted
<http://www.paulgraham.com/asterisk.html>

wumi, you win.

~~~
Xichekolas
You guys make me want to write a bot to crawl his site and just submit every
URL.

Would probably be funny until my account got deleted.

~~~
kirubakaran
There is an art to what I did. Instead of enjoying Piccasso, you are trying to
write a GIMP plugin for cubism effect. It is not the same, dude. ;)

------
jgrahamc
OK, I'll be the first to admit... I had to look up the meaning of "anaphora".

~~~
mhb
So you're not using aif or awhen I bet.

~~~
euccastro

        a·naph·o·ra [...]
            –noun
            1.  Also called epanaphora. Rhetoric. repetition of a word or words at the beginning of two or more successive verses, clauses, or sentences. [...]
            2.  Grammar. the use of a word as a regular grammatical substitute for a preceding word or group of words [...]
            3. (sometimes initial capital letter) Eastern Church. [...]
    

Aif and awhen use meaning 2, while this essay probably means 1.

------
mailanay
Interesting and quite useful. I have made so many false starts on starting a
blog of my own, that I have lost count. Being a founder of a software startup,
I know I have to start blogging sooner than later, but (this may sound really
weird) so far I have not had the courage. This essay will help me organize my
thoughts and take me closer to "putting pen on paper"

------
brion
Another added tip for writing and, this can be used for almost anything, is
following the Statement Example and Explain format. (SEE) It is very English
101 but always helps, e.g., “I need you to change the font to bold”
(Statement) “See this is how you do it <strong> my bold text</strong>”
(Example) “ Once we make the change visitors will be able to read the text
better” (Explain) Or “I love you” (s) “I think about you all the time” (e)
“This is why we should get married” (e)

------
GavinB
Here's one: If your essay turns into a list, use bullet points or numbers
rather than a block of semicolons.

Otherwise, great stuff. I like that pg's advice for writing--create a first
draft and iterate rapidly--is exactly the same as his advice for creating
startups.

~~~
amjith
Amen to that. I had to fight hard to finish the article.

~~~
abstractwater
After the first 2 items of the list I realized it was indeed a list until the
end: from that point, knowing the structure of the article made the reading
even easier.

------
ggruschow
Interesting that most of the advice can be well applied to programming also.

------
lux
Nice ending! Poetic even :)

------
edw519
Don't be afraid to use long sentences.

There are no rules, only guidelines.

~~~
daveambrose
If, and only if, you can craft one that makes sense and is coherent.

------
mcormier
He uses too many semi-colons for my liking.

~~~
Darmani
Most modern English speakers seem to use way, way fewer semicolons than they
should; I'm not sure whether to blame this on education or if it's just the
bar for publishing being lowered; nevertheless, the vast majority of people
I've talked to don't know to use semicolons with coordinating adverbs (or
whatever they're called) such as "however" and "nevertheless;" oftentimes they
also don't know that comma-splices are bad; as an amateur Grammar-nazi, this
general practice really irks me.

~~~
allenbrunson
kurt Vonnegut was rather famously against the use of semicolons. it made me
rethink their usage. these days i'm more likely to use two sentences to convey
the same idea.

~~~
nazgulnarsil
there are three ways to break up the flow of writing. . is to start an
entirely new subject , is to stay on the same subject ; is somewhere in
between, you're still on the same topic but have switched focus.

another way to think of it is conversationally. a period is a breath, a coma
is a pause, a semi is a slightly longer pause.

