New to Narnia? Love C.S. Lewis? Check Out My Uncle’s Book

My uncle, George Beahm, has written a nice introduction to C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia series. I just finished reading it and learned some interesting things about Lewis that I, as a huge Lewis fan, wasn’t aware of.

While it’s written as a primer for those who aren’t that familiar with the Narnia books, Beahm’s book, Passport To Narnia: A Newcomer’s Guide, contains some good stuff for readers of any familiarity level.

Beahm gives some background to Lewis himself, looks at the book series, the movie versions, and digs up lots of other Narnia resources (Narnia jewlery, sculptures, radio versions, and more).

The many illustrations throughout the book by Tim Kirk are excellent, adding a magical touch to the book.

Beahm says, “There are many books available about C.S. Lewis and, especially, Narnia, but most of them are scholarly or religious, so where is an introduction for new readers?

If you’ve found your way to Narnia through the Disney movie, this book will take you back through the wardrobe….A primer on Lewis and his fictional world of Narnia, this book is intended to be a passport for new travelers.”

Though it’s for newcomers to Lewis and Narnia, like I said, the book has information that long-time Lewis readers might not have known.

For example, even though The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is the most popular book in the Narnia series, the first Narnia book that Lewis wrote, and the book that Disney chose to begin its film franchise, The Magician’s Nephew is actually the real beginning of the series.

Though it was the sixth book written, The Magician’s Nephew should be read first, as it’s a prequel to the rest of the series, telling the back-story of Narnia and laying the foundation for all of the other books.

Passport To Narnia: A Newcomer’s Guide is an enjoyable, informative read on a great writer and his greatest series of books. Check it out.

How to Become a More Clear and Concise Writer by Reading Road Signs

“Omit needless words.”–William Strunk, Jr.

Whether you’re writing a magazine article, marketing copy, or especially, a blog post or email, conciseness is key.

Presumably you have a purpose in writing, a point to make, a message to send–you can get that message across more powerfully and effectively if you only use the words absolutely necessary for your readers to understand what you’re saying.

Here’s a simple exercise you can use to begin developing the mental perspective necessary to write more clearly and concisely: hop in your car, drive around town, and read every road sign you see.

Do it once as a crash course and then, let it become second nature as you’re driving around on your daily travels.

Here’s why this exercise can be so helpful:

People who write road signs have very little space within which to get their message across; they don’t have the luxury (I would call it a hindrance) to jazz up their writing with fancy prose or unnecessary words.

They have a very short space to write on and the fewer and larger the words on a road sign, the more likely drivers are to see the words and process the message it’s conveying.

Look at the copy from three road signs I found on Google Images:

Speed Limit 50
Next 416 Miles

Do Not Enter

Sandy Creek 5
Watertown 29

Immediately, you know exactly what each sign’s message is.

Speed Limit 50
Next 416 Miles: for the next 416 miles of this stretch of road, you’ll be going 50 miles per hour. Unless you want to risk a speeding ticket.

Do Not Enter: you’re in for trouble if you try to come this way, so don’t do it. Period.

Sandy Creek 5
Watertown 29: from your current location, you’re five miles from Sandy Creek and 29 miles from Watertown.

Only words which are absolutely necessary to get a message across are chosen–road sign authors must choose the few words they can put on a sign with extreme precision.

Do the same in your own writing. Choose the right words, the most exactly descriptive words, and keep your words to a minimum. Say exactly what you have to say and be done with it.

Now, go read some road signs to begin developing the skill of writing more clearly and concisely. Maybe I’ll see you out there–I’ll be doing the same thing.

Are You Living Actively or Reactively?

I’ve written recently about respecting your time and enjoying the blogosphere without letting it reduce your productivity. One of the things that many people are struggling with these days, especially online workers and entrepreneurs, is the speed of the Internet and its constant claim on our time.

For instance, must you read every single blog post in your feed reader every single day (or at least check out the title of each post)? How fast must you respond to every email? Must you respond to every email? How often should you check your email each day? Should you check your mail first thing in the morning or accomplish some important tasks first?

While people continue to find what works for them, I’ll share the following quote from Tim Ferriss on the matter. It really leapt out at me and speaks to my views. The trick is finding out how to adopt this perspective while still being professional and successful.

Ferriss says:

“Is responding to all inquiries on a moment’s notice really success? I would argue it is a reactive mode that precludes life, at least the type of life I want to have.” [Emphasis mine]

If You’re Insincere, Your Writing May Be Unclear

Similar to liars whose “explanations” often go on and on and include lots of seemingly detailed yet vague pieces of information, writers who aren’t really committed to what they’re writing can end up (intentionally or unintentionally) using lots of clichés, clichés that shade their true intentions, thoughts, or meanings.

George Orwell keenly noted this in his landmark essay, “Politics and the English Language”:

“The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink.” [Emphasis mine]

Orwell was primarily writing about how political regimes manipulate the language so that they say one thing (that sounds reasonable and good on the surface) but mean another (which is often negative or outright evil). The regimes play with the language to conceal their true purposes.

Orwell gives some specific examples:

“Defenseless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements.”

Notice in this next example how a fictional professor’s true ideas are expressed very clearly in a short, direct sentence; when he’s trying to hold onto to his real and unpopular views without explicitly declaring them, his sentence becomes outrageously long-winded and incredibly vague.

Orwell says:

“Consider for instance some comfortable English professor defending Russian totalitarianism. He cannot say outright, ‘I believe in killing off your opponents when you can get good results by doing so.’ Probably, therefore, he will say something like this:

‘While freely conceding that the Soviet regime exhibits certain features which the humanitarian may be inclined to deplore, we must, I think, agree that a certain curtailment of the right to political opposition is an unavoidable concomitant of transitional periods, and that the rigors which the Russian people have been called upon to undergo have been amply justified in the sphere of concrete achievement.’”

Long words and exhausted idioms indeed.

By minimizing idioms, or clichés, in your own writing, you can avoid clouding your meaning and risking charges of insincerity or lack of interest.

When you don’t truly believe in what you’re writing or you’re not sure exactly what it is that you want to say (or how to say it), inevitably, the clichés start to come out and your prose begins to go on and on.

Idioms do have their place (if used well), but generally it’s best to avoid them–unless you really know what you’re doing. Usually, it’s best to figure out exactly what you want to say and then simply and clearly say it.

If you want your writing to be clear, start with a thesis that is sincere.

One Simple Trick to Writing Concisely

Note: Today’s post is one of the most popular posts I ran on my original blog, Vigorous Writing. This, however, is a remix version–I’ve edited it to make it more concise. The advice in this post has been extremely beneficial to my own writing. I hope you enjoy it.

“Omit needless words. Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.”–William Strunk, Jr.

“If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.”–George Orwell

Writing concisely is a key to writing clearly. If you keep your words to a minimum, the minimum necessary to get your message across, you are more likely to be read and comprehended.

If you tend to ramble (to write more than is necessary to make your point), then apply this trick to your prose: eliminate metadiscourse.

Metadiscourse is writing about writing, adding words to comment on your own writing. Metadiscourse is extraneous and often unnecessary.

Some metadiscourse phrases are: to sum up; candidly; I believe; note that; it has become clear; I would like to point out.

Examples

Metadiscourse version:

“I would like to personally thank you for your time yesterday.”

Concise version:

“Thank you for your time yesterday.”

The metadiscourse in the above sentence is the entire beginning–”I would like to personally…” It is not necessary to tell the person that you would like to thank him right before you thank him; just thank him.

Metadiscourse version:

“Here’s a news flash: You’re not the only one to experience this.”

More concise version:

“News flash: You’re not the only one to experience this.”

Concise version: “You’re not the only one to experience this.”

There’s no need to tell your reader that you’re about to tell him some news–just tell him. Certainly don’t say, “Here is…” Just say it from the outset. Don’t add filler.

Metadiscourse version:

“This is the reality: For all intents and purposes, you may as well be a fly on the wall when you’re with that crowd.”

More concise version:

“The reality: You may as well be a fly on the wall when you’re with them.”

Concise version:

“They don’t notice you.”

The Point is to Get to the Point

Some writers will object that I’m cutting too many words and stripping the poetry from prose. Not really. Most “extra” writing is just that–extra.

It’s not necessary and it makes you take longer to get to your point, sometimes burying your thesis. When writing anything, you want your main point to be explicitly clear, and by eliminating metadiscourse, you can more easily do that.

Bad:

“It is my opinion that we should cut taxes.”

Okay:

“I believe we should cut taxes.”

Better:

“We should cut taxes.”

Best:

“Cut taxes.”

We cut our word count from nine to two and got our point out more quickly and clearly than we would have if we had tried to sound “professional” and serious.

If you are the one saying we should cut taxes, then anyone listening already understands that you believe we should cut taxes (because you’re the one saying so) and absolutely gets that this is your opinion (again, because you’re the one saying it).

Bottom Line

Some metadiscourse is necessary to prevent your sounding utterly pompous (just declaring things without any qualification), but most of it bogs down your writing.

Remember: when you catch yourself describing what you’re about to say, cut the filler and just say it.

The Writer’s Energy Drink

Recently, I wrote about writer’s block, offering what I think is the best way to overcome it–take a break to refresh and then come back and begin writing. Period. I believe most writer’s block is actually procrastination and laziness.

I also mentioned that I planned on sharing some things that help me to create the energy and focus necessary to forge through difficult, time-consuming projects.

Today, I’m talking about the writer’s energy drink, a couple of drinks that I look to regularly to give me energy and vigor, especially when I’ve got real work to do.

Water

There are many times I’ve felt utterly exhausted, weak, unable to concentrate, and very sleepy–even though I got a full night’s rest and I’m not sick.

My solution? Drinking water. I’ve found that when I feel as I do above, in almost all cases, about 30 minutes to an hour after drinking two to four full glasses of water, I completely wake up and feel incredibly energized.

Without fail.

Dehydration is a huge zap on your energy levels and ability to concentrate. As the Ririan Project notes, “Even minor dehydration can cause impaired concentration, headaches, irritability and fatigue.”

Green Tea

Being part Japanese, I’ve been around green tea for awhile, but it wasn’t until a couple of years ago that I began drinking it.

It has caffeine, which helps energize you, but the levels of caffeine aren’t as high as those found in coffee or typical sugar-drenched energy drinks.

Al Sears, MD, writes on his experience switching from coffee to green tea in the morning. He says, “I’ve noticed a surprising benefit. The tea wakes me out of my morning stupor like coffee - but unlike coffee, instead of making me feel a little nervous and shaky, the green tea makes me feel calm.”

You can brew your own green tea (which I do sometimes) or buy it bottled (which I do a lot). My favorite bottled green teas are from Honest Tea and Ito En:

Honest Tea Organic Honey Green Tea

Ito En Oi Ocha Green Tea

Another reason I much prefer to get my caffeine from tea than soda or typical energy drinks is that tea has less (and often no) sugar or calories, and it contains lots of healthy antioxidants–something soda doesn’t.

What Do You Drink?

What do you drink to give you energy and bring on some creativity? Share in the comments. It’d be interesting to see what your fellow writers and bloggers drink to fuel themselves in preparation for upcoming tasks.

Enjoying the Blogosphere Without Letting it Reduce Your Productivity

My last post generated some perspectives in the comments on how fellow writers and bloggers manage their online time–reading blogs, commenting on blogs, using Twitter, and other such things not directly related to actually writing or blogging.

While (most of) these things are necessary if you want to have a profitable online presence, too much of it can detract from your ultimate goals.

James Chartrand was certainly right when he pointed out that:

“If you aren’t marketing yourself, you won’t have any billable work at all. Period. None.

Reading blogs, commenting, Twitter… that’s all marketing. Sure, you have to know the balance and determine which medium will bring you the ROI, but if you don’t try to see which one is going to get you more business for the least amount of work… then you’re shooting yourself in the foot.

A lack of presence in the blogosphere is detrimental to your business. So choose wisely and be present.”

The problem for many of us comes when we let this activity consume far more of our time than does actually working on projects. Regular marketing is certainly mandatory, at least when we’re still building our business. I’m still highly suspicious of the marketing viability of Twitter, though–most of the people using it have been upfront that they haven’t really drummed up any direct business from it.

So, how can you maintain a blogosphere presence and still get plenty of work done? Here are some of the ways that your fellow Robust Writing readers do it.

Limit How Many Blogs You Keep Up With

Bamboo Forest said:

“And as far as commenting on other blogs… I’ve decided only to subscribe to a few. I try to be adamant about reading each entry of the few I’m subscribed to, but I do not go beyond those that I have budgeted myself for. I think it really comes down to realizing that one’s energy is finite. Since it is finite, you must channel it to the places it’s going to have the greatest impact, and cut it off where the effect is minimal.”

Determine How Much Time Per Day to Read Blogs and Stick to It

Cheryl said:

“I set aside the first hour of the day to read and stay up to speed. The only time I don’t allot this hour for reading is when I’m up against a really tight deadline. Reading and educating myself is essential to my marketing position, but as many others have stated, time can and does slip through our fingers. Allotting an hour a day seems to work for me.”

Sara said:

“Like Cheryl, I set concrete time limits on how long I can spend reading and commenting. But in that time, I let myself take as many tangents as I please, and this has been good for finding fresh new ideas and keeping things fun.

I’m also actively minimizing the number of social networking apps I’m involved in. I’d rather be a dedicated user of one community than a sampler of all.”

Use Reading Blogs as a Reward Once You’ve Finished Your Work

Devon said:

“I do my yoga and then write my first 1K of the day. Then I put up my latest blog post and read a couple of the ones on my daily blog reads.

I check my email and answer the most important; then I go back to the day’s writing.

My reward for hitting certain points in my writing day is getting to read more blogs.

But NONE of that happens until my first 1K of the day is done.”

The Key

The key theme seems to be setting limits, setting limits to how many blogs you will actually stay up to date on and interact with through commenting, and setting limits on how much time each day you will spend doing blogging and other marketing stuff.

I’ve vastly reduced the number of blogs I subscribe to, keeping only those that have given me real, consistent value over a significant period of time.

Not only does this leave me more time to do other necessary things, but by only paying attention to a set number of blogs, I have more time and energy to actually become involved in the conversations on those blogs.

By commenting more regularly on the same blogs, I can actually build a better presence than if I sporadically comment on a hundred different blogs every week.

In an upcoming post, I’ll share how I’ve determined which blogs to keep up with and which to let go, as well as some concrete methods I’ve implemented that enable me to enjoy my time in the blogosphere without spending too much time hunting around in it.

I used to get stressed out sometimes when I’d log into my feed reader and see how many new posts waiting to be read were in there. Then I’d spend way too much time reading those feeds. This chaos went on every day. Something had to give–and did.

I feel so much better now. More in a future post.

Do You Respect Your Own Time?

“The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.”–C.S. Lewis

“Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.”–James 4:14 (English Standard Version)

Bob Bly recently wrote that “if you are spending endless hours reading posts, comments, and messages online, those are hours you are not spending on the tasks for which you are paid a salary — or in the case of the self-employed, on billable work.”

That’s one of the reasons why I haven’t joined up in the Twitter buzz–it just seems like another time-waster to be blunt about it. I know there are many (some highly successful) bloggers and writers actively using it. But…like any other medium–Digg, Stumble, Facebook, or blogging itself–it seems that for it to really pay off, you have to invest significant and consistent time and energy in it. Whether you’re working for someone else or you’re your own boss, working time really ought to be spent on working.

Especially if you’re self-employed–if you’re spending a lot of time on a daily basis wandering through the blogosphere, no matter how great some of the information you come across can be, you’re probably negatively impacting your career and financial success.

I love reading certain blogs and I’ve really benefited regularly from several, such as The Blog of Tim Ferriss, Men with Pens, and Get Rich Slowly, for example.

But, the temptation is always there to squander vast amounts of valuable time. I might read a great blog post, which will move me to comment on it, offering my perspective on the subject…I’ll sign up for email notifications of follow-up comments…I may be interested in responding to some of the responses…the post may contain some links to other great sites that I want to check out…and so on.

And that’s just on one blog, all from one blog post. Multiply that by the number of blogs many of us read regularly and add Twitter to the mix, with all of the people you’re following and so on. You really could spend all day just doing blogging and other messaging stuff and not accomplish a thing.

So, how do you avoid this temptation?

How do you manage your time so that you can enjoy your favorite blogs and perhaps engage in other online activities without letting it negatively impact your work, the stuff that ultimately pays your bills?

Five Tips for Good Writing from C.S. Lewis

I just saw The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, the second film in the movie series based on C.S. Lewis’ seven fantasy novels of the same name. Though he is well-known, for those of you who aren’t that familiar with Lewis, here’s a quick snapshot:

C.S. Lewis (1898–1963) was an Irishman and an English professor at Oxford University, where he became a close friend of J.R.R. Tolkien. Lewis wroteThe Problem of Pain and Mere Christianity, among many other books. His “works have been translated into more than 30 languages and have sold more than a million copies per year. The books that comprise The Chronicles of Narnia have sold more than 100 million copies,” according to Wikipedia.

Why Lewis Is So Good

C.S. Lewis is probably my favorite writer of all time. He was a very versatile writer–he wrote theology, poetry, literature, fantasy (both adult and children’s), apologetics, cultural analysis, devotional, and autobiographical.

His ability to combine razor-sharp intellectual insight with a deep, visionary imagination draws me in.

John Piper explains Lewis’ genius this way:

“[Lewis] demonstrated for me and convinced me that rigorous, precise, penetrating logic is not inimical to deep, soul-stirring feeling and vivid, lively, even playful imagination. He was a ‘romantic rationalist.’”

The Chronicles of Narnia was written for children and the movies are also marketed to kids, but as an adult, I’ve really enjoyed the two Narnia movies that Disney has made so far, and am looking forward to seeing the rest of the novels adapted to film as well.

I encourage all of you to go see the The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian while it’s still showing widely in theaters. Being transported into the highly scenic natural Narnian landscape is a nice escape,

C.S. Lewis’ Five Tips for Good Writing

While you’re checking out the show times for the film at your local theater, I’d like to share five tips on clear writing that Lewis gave to children–like the Narnia series, though, this writing advice is beneficial to adults as well.

Herewith (HT to Piper for this):

1. Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn’t mean anything else.
2. Always prefer the clean direct word to the long, vague one. Don’t implement promises, but keep them.
3. Never use abstract nouns when concrete ones will do. If you mean “More people died” don’t say “Mortality rose.”
4. In writing, don’t use adjectives which merely tell us how you want us to feel about the things you are describing. I mean, instead of telling us the thing is “terrible,” describe it so that we’ll be terrified. Don’t say it was “delightful”; make us say “delightful” when we’ve read the description. You see, all those words (horrifying, wonderful, hideous, exquisite) are only like saying to your readers “Please, will you do my job for me.”
5. Don’t use words too big for the subject. Don’t say “infinitely” when you mean “very”; otherwise you’ll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. [bold emphasis mine]

For more information on C.S. Lewis check out Into the Wardrobe and for more information about the Chronicles of Narnia movie series, check out NarniaWeb.