To: Dayuhan who wrote (3233 ) 7/24/1999 11:08:00 PM From: The Philosopher Read Replies (3) | Respond to
As a sophisticated user of the language, do you strive to make your writing correct Do you think the two are the same? No. But you can do both in the same message. That's what distinguishes great from good writing. EB White wrote very correctly but also very beautifully. Is the use of "dialogue" or "expertise" as verbs aesthetically pleasing, to your ear? Dialogue, yes in certain contexts. Expertize (the preferred spelling of the verb form) no. (I would point out that I did not use expertise; it was used by somebody else, and I was challenged to find a justification for it, which I did.) I have flexible mental lists of the people on SI who I feel write well. These are the I would agree. But I also don't look for or expect good writing on most threads here. In my own case, my writing benefits from major editing. My first drafts of anything more than a simple letter almost always need editing. My writing technique is to get a lot of words and thoughts on paper (or on screen) and then go back and rework the thoughts and language. (White was that way -- he would often go three or four or more drafts of his work. Asimov, on the other hand, almost never rewrote. It's just a matter of how one's mind works.) I don't spend time editing most posts here, so most of what's here is far from my best writing. I assume that's true for many others here, so I tend to judge what's here by content rather than style.
