From the archives – May 2015:
I was curious. Being a writer, I keep seeing articles about the editing software available online to help writers and, over coffee, I thought I would have a quick look. I browsed a number of them, duly pasting a chunk of text into their little blank boxes to see what they had to offer.
After five minutes, my blood was boiling.
Writers, it seems, are being encouraged to use these programmes. Not, as I mistakenly supposed, in order to check their grammar, spelling and punctuation… say, as an extension to spellcheck or as a different perspective on work we are too fond of, and too involved with, to see clearly. No. We are being encouraged to use them in order to erase our personal voice.
Okay, I know… that probably isn’t entirely fair.
There are those who swear by their usefulness, though these, I suspect, are writers who use such programmes as useful adjuncts to, rather than dictators of style. They do give another perspective… almost another set of eyes on your work. There are many who have a story worth telling who have yet to find a literary voice they feel at ease with. There are some who want to write, hearing the stories in their mind, but do not know where to begin to shape a tale. Such software can provide a useful guide. There are others, experienced and not wishing to become complacent, who will appreciate a different slant on the editing process. Many such automated sites are also free and thus accessible to those who cannot afford to outsource either editing or proofreading to the real, live professionals who really know their craft.
But honestly, after the third such site, I was raging… Let me tell you why…
1. The school report
Some will ‘grade’ your writing, judging its accessibility to age and educational levels. Some call it a readability score. Which, of course, is all well and good. You wouldn’t want an entertaining romp to be written in academic terms and, for a children’s piece, it might be useful to be aware of the average language skills of the age group for which you are intending to write.
Of course, you could, potentially, do the unthinkable and actually talk to a child. Or give the book to a child of that age group … I’m fairly sure that as a beta reader they would do a good job. It didn’t do Tolkien any harm.
2. The dictatorship
Some will tell you quite simply – Adverb. Remove it.
Now we all know that the humble adverb has come in for a lot of flak. But if it is good enough for J.K Rowling then I don’t feel we should be too worried by allowing the odd one or two to creep in. In fact, I’m not entirely sure we should worry about them at all, as long as they are well used, well-chosen and serve a definite purpose.
But – Adverb. Remove it?
Grrrr… (should that have three Rs?).
Instead, look at the adverb. Does it actually add anything? Is there a more effective way of saying it? Have you used the odd one, or shaken the pepperpot on the page?
3. The guillotine
Sentences the programme considers too long will be highlighted in virulent colour. As will phrases it considers to be too complex. So, too, will any example of passive voice. Or words of more than one syllable. Or poetry.
You can accept the dictates of the machine and let it hack away at your prose. Alternatively, you can check punctuation. Read the phrase aloud… if it still makes perfect sense and says what you want it to say, leave it alone.
4. The robot.
These programmes do not recognise humour, lyricism or personality. Nor do they understand the informal use of punctuation, the curtailed phrasing or grammatical quirks of speech. You know… as if a human being, not a literary god, is speaking…
Speech, either reported or when writing in a conversational tone, uses a whole different set of unwritten rules. What would be anathema in a literary masterpiece is perfectly acceptable here… and breaks as many rules as it likes.
If what you have written is what your character wants to say and in character… why change it?
5. The alien.
Not only should our phrases be short, snappy and to the point, but, according to the programmed literary rules, we should, it appears, erase all trace of the rich tapestry of human emotion. No flowing and lyrical descriptions here, if you please!
Nor does personality seem to have a place in these programmes. How could it? Can they understand the finer, almost indefinable shades of humour, allusion and pun? Or the emotional associations of words that will vary age to age, culture to culture? Do their emotions unconsciously respond to that creative use of imagery and punctuation that adds an indefinable something to the words? They can only judge by ‘rules’ and since when have artists… including writers… been subject to conforming to a designated mould?
In fact, stick this article into one of these programmes and it will come back, I guarantee, with more colours than a Carnival in Rio. I know. I tried.
Which was one of the things that made my blood boil.
Not, I hasten to add, because I cannot take criticism of my literary ‘masterpiece’… that’s the whole point. This is not, nor was it designed to be, anything other than the type of debate I might have over coffee with a friend. It is neither high romance nor academic paper… though it might well hold a tragedy for writers whose confidence in their own voice may be damaged by the dictates of some sites and the ‘style guides’ that inform them. Which leads me to…
6. The magic mirror.
Some of these programmes are geared towards shaping your work into the style of iconic writers.
Why should we want to write in anyone else’s voice but our own? I doubt if those same iconic writers copied the voices of others. They broke ground for themselves, though were, without a doubt, influenced by what they themselves had read and been moved by. There is a difference between aspiration born of admiration and being subtly edged towards mimicking the style of a writer seen as successful by the establishment. Nothing wrong with the former… but what motivates the latter?
There is a publicity machine behind the Big Names. Publishing is a business, and like any other, its aim is to make money. Nothing wrong with that at all… except that, as with many things, it is seen as safer to go with the known and proven that the unknown and therefore risky.
What worries me is that the programming has to be based on an accepted standard. One that increasingly appears to feel we should dumb down our writing, spelling out everything in words of no more than one syllable.
Kafka, Shakespeare, Twain… and probably all the great writers of history would, without the shadow of a doubt, make my Carnival in Rio look about as colourful as a convent had they used some of these sites!
I doubt there is a writer alive who wouldn’t be happy to earn the delight engendered by Pratchett, the financial success of a Rowling, the respect shown to King, or the love given to the creations of Tolkien. While the imaginations of such writers are undoubtedly incredible, their style and voice is their own and places their signature upon their work. And as such, they no different from the many thousands of others who may never see more than a handful of their own books sold.
But, we can dream… and from those dreams we weave our stories. Not carbon copies, poor relations or mirror images… our stories.
I have broken pretty much all of the literary ‘rules’ in this one article, from parentheses to colloquialisms. If I’ve left any out, do let me know… I did try…
These programmes do have their place. They are tools for writers. They can highlight possible areas of text that would benefit from polishing. They can suggest alternatives. They may boost the confidence of the novice and the clarity of the experienced writer. But they are just that… tools; designed to be of use to the creative mind, not to constrain it within the narrow tramlines of conformity, nor to insult the intelligence of the reader by making books so easy to skim that mind and imagination need barely be involved in the process.
Reading a book is a wonderful thing. A relationship develops between reader and writer, speaking mind to mind and often heart to heart. The writer’s vision has no life at all once it sleeps between the covers of a closed book. It is only awakened by the imagination of the reader following the echo of a writer’s dream.
We love the work of individual authors because they engage us on a particular and intimate level; their words, as much as their ideas, resonate with something within ourselves. They weave language that portrays and evokes human emotion in a way only another human being could understand. They make us laugh, pull at our heartstrings or keep us on the edges of our seats. Because their voices are unique and recognisable. Your voice too is unique and personal… and no computer programme should be allowed to erase or stifle its song.
Sue Vincent's Daily Echo 
Brilliantly scathing. I immediately thought of 1984 and the computers pumping out one novel after another of propo nonsense. We come closer and closer to the membrane separating life & lit…
LikeLike
Technology is a wonderful thing… as long as we remember why we desugned it. To help, not control us.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Here, here!
LikeLike
🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Highly entertaining, and true. “Editing” programs can make an incredible mess of your manuscript if you believe every suggestion they make! They don’t understand context, and in writing, context is everything.
LikeLike
I agree, Connie. There are subtleties that defy the rule-book that only another human being will pick up.
LikeLike
Thanks for this beautiful post Sue. I learned the human side of writing.
LikeLike
Thank you, Joel. Writing is uniquely human…and as far as the machines are concerned, must remain so.
LikeLiked by 1 person
You’re welcome. Have a great week ahead.
LikeLike
You too, Joel.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I actually remember this one. Forget the grammar. We need a smarter spell-checker that not only notices if a word is spelled correctly, but if it is the right word at all!
LikeLike
Contextual spellchecking would be exceedingly useful!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Quite rightly so Sue. It’s bad enough Word getting hysterical over Reflexive Pronouns and Fragments. (and some quirk whereby it tries to change First Person to Third Person making the whole passage ridiculous)
LikeLike
Don’t get me started on Word, Roger! Much as I love it, its editing leaves much to be desired 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
A system designed for business presentations and so forth leaves much to be desired as far as writers are concerned. (Hrrumphh!!)
LikeLike
I still like Word better than anything else I’ve tried…mainly because it tends to leave me alone unless I ask it for anything 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
True. As much as I grumble about it (I loves a good grumble), I’m stuck with it.🙂
LikeLike
You have to have a grumble occasionally 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s an art form 🙂
LikeLike
Oh yes… 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
you delight us in so many ways – wonderful piece
LikeLike
Thank you, Paul.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on Anita Dawes & Jaye Marie.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I am guilty of using one of these tools, only because I have forgotten more about English grammar than I knew in the first place. It would be great if I was clever enough not to need any help…
LikeLike
Nothing wrong with using a tool… that is what they are there for. It is those who allow themselves to be ruled by them that worry me.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I know what you mean, they are supposed to help, not do the job for you. So far, there is no substitute for the human mind…
LikeLike
I doubt if there ever can be, it is the most amazing thing…and we still know so little of it too.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I use some of these tools, mostly because my natural writing style is filled with passive voice, but I do still seek out human help when I am done.
LikeLike
Tools have their uses…as long as we use them as such and don’t lose our voices to them.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on Just Can't Help Writing and commented:
I will add to this: The darn programs are all too often just plain wrong! Can’t tell you how many sentences Word’s editor labeled fragments, and how many actual fragments it missed! And any time a mechanical “editor” gives you a piece of advice about punctuation, check the editor’s rule against at least a couple of standard handbooks before kowtowing to some dictator’s orders.
I can’t say enough for real readers. Okay, so they, too, are sometimes “wrong.” Or wrong-headed. But a) they can and usually do explain why they reacted a certain way to something you wrote, and b) they respond to the very things the robots and aliens discussed in this article glide right past—the emotion, the rhythm, the energy, the joy.
Don’t pore over some grammar or editing site. Join a writers’ group!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you.
LikeLike
My husband bought me a subscription of Grammarly. I love it. There is a Word app that helps with passive voice, other grammar, and punctuation. It has made all the difference in my manuscript. I swear by it! ❤️
LikeLike
Using such programmes as tools is great. Letting them rule your style is where I see the problem with them…we have a voice to use …or to lose.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Of course you’re correct. Punctuation kills me. Those darn commas and semi-colons! That was the hardest part. I am writing YA fantasy. I tried to keep my words in the spirit of what a fourteen year old would say and think. But I didn’t “dumb” it down either. I am still discovering my voice. ❤️
LikeLike
Punctuation can be a nightmare…but I don’t think it is a crime to bend the rules a little now and then. Writing for an age-based audience cannot be an easy task, especially when so many adults read children’s literature too. I still do and although I don’t mind simplicity in language, I could wish that some writers didn’t oversimplify quite so much.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I used a young beta reader and she said some of sentences were too complicated. I did change some things. But not too much. How can a teen learn or stretch their own writing or learning if we keep it too simple. I read Charles Dickens at a young age. Some of those concepts were different and unusual for me. That didn’t stop me though. I went to the library (dating myself here) and researched the period so I could understand the setting, etc. Today, one can Google everything instantly. In fact, if you read on a Kindle you can press the word and find out the meaning immediately. All that I have read is about keeping your words simple so that they appeal to a wider audience. Let’s put it this way. I will probably fall over if someone buys my book! LOL! ❤
LikeLike
Making something readable…and getting it read by someone who might normally read it… is perfect. But I agree.. here we had Dickens by 11 and Shakespeare soon after. It is by stretching that you learn, not by staying with what you already know. ❤
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hear. Hear. 😀 ❤
LikeLiked by 1 person
🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Brilliant post Sue! Here, here on your theories. Like many a good writing book says ‘ know the rules first before you begin to break them’. It’s no different having our work edited. Yes, the bad stuff has to go, but a good editor will also offer ‘suggestions’ of a particular passage which could be rewritten another way that sometimes doesn’t jive with my meaning. We don’t have to take every suggestion either as long as what we’ve written is sound and correctly written.
I loved the little infograph of errors detected; looks familiar, was that taken from Prowritingaid? 🙂
LikeLike
I agree, Debby, so much of writing… and reading … is subjective and, if your meaning is clear and correct, stick with it.
The graphic is a screenshot of Hemingway, if I remember right.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Sue. Similar infographics with Prowritingaid. 🙂
LikeLike
Hmmm…. 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on Archer's Aim and commented:
Much like online translation, editing programs should be taken with a grain of salt.
LikeLiked by 1 person