Writing Mastery

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The best writers are easy to read--and yet so deep and profound that you can re-read their work over and over again, learning something new each time. What makes that possible?

I've thought about this a lot in connection with Ayn Rand's writings. What is the difference between her writing and my own--qua writing? One crucial aspect is degree of condensation. What Ayn Rand covers in a paragraph, I and other Objectivists will cover in a page.

For example, Rand gives her account of each virtue in a paragraph in Galt's speech. Leonard Peikoff expanded that paragraph into a section in Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand. Tara Smith expanded that to a chapter in Ayn Rand's Normative Ethics.

The difference at each step is not one of clarity. Tara's account of independence is not clearer than Rand's.

The difference between a paragraph and a page is the amount of independent processing the audience has to do for a given idea. A reader of Tara's book has to do less work to draw out all of the implications than a reader of Galt's speech. They still have to independently process the material in the sense of do the mental work to think: what's being said and is it true? But they now have the aid of elaborations, examples, helpful formulations and integrations, etc.

One of the reasons Rand's writing is so condensed is that she's usually using the deepest ideas in philosophy to explain the world. "Faith and Force" isn't a textbook on altruism; it's a sweeping account of "where we are, how we got here, and where we should go." In the space of a single talk, she has given the reader a new way to think of history and the world. And, for many readers or listeners, it is precisely that high-level explanatory power that motivates them to want to understand Rand's analysis of altruism in all its gory detail.

A deeper perspective on condensation

But that's not the whole answer. It doesn't explain how one can be condensed and yet clear. How does Rand pack a chapter into a paragraph without the paragraph seeming abstract and vague?

I think this ability is related to the idea that the true sign of understanding a complex idea is the ability to explain it simply. This leads the audience to think: oh, what a simple idea! But as they progress, they start to appreciate the kind of complexity that went in to achieving that simplicity. After a long struggle, they reach a point where they can hold the idea first-handedly in simple terms, while retaining the richness underneath it. 

For example, have you ever listened to Richard Feynman explain a concept from physics? He makes you feel as if you understand the idea. And you do! But you don't understand it the way a physicist understands it. In particular, you can't use the idea to understand other ideas: you need a Feynman to work those out as well. 

Let me give one example that I think crystalizes how this works in practice. But to explain the example, I need to back up for a moment and explain a more general principle of communication. 

One of the principles of the Objectivist epistemology is that we don't try to formulate principles by looking at borderline cases--we formulate them by looking at center-of-the-page cases and then using principles to untangle complexity. You don't try to understand the issue of the initiation of force by thinking about patents, abortion, and gun control--you think about murder, robbery, a punch in the mouth.

A similar principle applies in communication: you state an idea in clear-cut, simple terms--and then you go on to qualify it. 

What you often see poor communicators is that they try to make each formulate fully precise on its own. For example, here's how I defined free speech in a 2007 op-ed: "Free speech means the right to express the products of the mind (scientific conclusions, artistic creations, political views, etc.) using whatever words or images one chooses over a medium one can rightfully access, without interference by the government." 

What a mess! But you can see what I'm trying to do, right? I'm trying to pack in everything one needs to understand free speech into the definition. 

Contrast that with Rand's definition: "The right of free speech means that a man has the right to express his ideas without danger of suppression, interference or punitive action by the government."

Notice how clear and simple it is--and yet notice that without additional explanation, e.g., about its relationship to property rights, the reader is in the position of me when I listen to Feynman on physics. 

The free speech example helps us understand how Rand can be extremely clear and easy to read, while "disguising" an enormous amount of complexity. In this case, Rand does elaborate her definition of free speech. She helps you work through some of the complexity that went into her simple definition. 

But in other cases, she doesn't give you those elaborations. And so the experience is: each thing she says is simple and clear--and yet to really understand it you have a lot more work to do.

Takeaways

One lesson here is to be aware of the level of condensation you're operating on. You need a sense of how much you're leaving to the reader.

There's often a desire to eliminate condensation--to leave nothing to the reader in an effort to make the definitive argument. Instead of condensation, you attempt comprehensiveness. But that's a fool's errand. There's always more to say, there are always depths to uncover. You can never do the reader's work for him.

Another lesson is that--at whatever level you're writing--what you want to achieve is the experience on the part of the reader of effortless clarity. Write at whatever level you can successfully make the messy world out there simple--without oversimplifying.