Let’s sit together and write the perfect sentence.
What does it look like?
Perhaps there’s an ideal length? Maybe we need to keep it simple: short and to the point.
Once you get right down to it, pulling together a brilliant sentence seems harder so much harder than it sounds.
When I’m writing a new blog post, I often get stuck, wrangling words into patterns that just don’t seem right.
Too often I struggle with clunky sentences that don’t convey my real meaning.
I’ve been writing professionally since 2004, and I battle still.
That’s why I set out to uncover a set of best practices: simple tools we could use to express our thoughts.
Here I’m sharing some of my favourite resources from the best writing guides.
4 steps to writing better sentences
Have you ever been reading a blog post when suddenly you struggle to follow along? There’s many reasons that may happen. Maybe the point the writer’s trying to make just isn’t clear, or perhaps it doesn’t make sense. Suddenly, keeping pace is hard work.
The truth is it’s easy to overcomplicate things. I can obsess about how I’d like a sentence to sound or get fancy with varying sentence structures.
But sometimes all that does is get in the way of what I’m trying to say.
Think about it:
What are you truly trying to accomplish with your blog post?
You’re determined to persuade, entertain, or inform your reader.
You accomplish that by creating useful content. Here’s where clear, concise sentences come in.
Sentences are vehicles for our thoughts, a “way of thinking, opinion”, according to its Middle English origins.
So, conveying our opinions begins with writing better sentences.
And here are four strategies I use when I struggle.
- Keep sentences simple
Keeping sentences simple and short go a long way to improving understanding.
By definition, every sentence must have the following, according to The Only Grammar Book You’ll Ever Need:
- Predicate: the part of your sentence that modifies the subject in some way, usually that predicate is a verb
- Subject of the verb
- Complete thought
So, a complete sentence is as simple as:
“Children laugh.”
A good way to keep sentences short is to omit needless words, advice contained in Elements of Style.
“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. This requires not that the writer make all sentences short, or avoid all detail and treat subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.”
Elements of Style authors William Strunk and E.B. White provide the following examples:
- the question as to whether vs. whether
- there is no doubt but that vs. no doubt
- he is a man who vs. he
- this is a subject that vs. this subject
- the reason why is that vs. because
- Use basic grammar
Too many awkward sentences can be easily avoided. All it takes is basic grammar.
Grammar is an emotional subject for some. For me, it’s about meaning, not mastery of the English language.
When you place periods and commas when they’re supposed to be, you make it easier for the reader to understand your blog post.
Think about how many times you’ve been confused while reading a long, run-on sentence.
Here’s some quick grammar courses:
Grammar course from coursera.
Purdue presentation on commas
- Focus on verbs and nouns
Sentences are so useful, aren’t they?
Not only do they convey our opinions, they can move our stories along, adding excitement and pace into even the most pedestrian subjects.
How do we get that right?
It’s all thanks to nouns and verbs.
In this Creative Writing course, instructure Salvatore Scibona , said nouns and verbs “keep things going”. These parts of speech make up the “soul of the narrative”.
Focus on the nouns and verbs.
“Nouns and verbs rule the roost, why is that? Well when we talk, and when sometimes when we’re doing first drafts of things, we will throw in all kinds of words that might help us get the ideas moving, but they’re not the central elements of what we’re trying to say.”
A good way to keep this tip top of mind is to focus on people doing things. That person might be you or your reader.
In Writing Tools, Roy Peter Clark, recommends we begin sentences with subjects and verbs.
“Make meaning early and then let weaker elements branch to the right. Imagine each sentence you write printed on the world’s widest piece of paper. In English, a sentence stretches from the left to the right, so imagine a writer composes a sentence with subject and verb at the beginning, followed by other weaker elements, creating what scholars call a right-branching sentence.”
Clark uses this example from a 2004 article in the New York Times:
“Rebels seized control of Cap Haitien, Haiti’s second-largest city, on Sunday, meeting little resistance as hundreds of residents cheered, burned the police station, plundered food from port warehouses and looted the airport, which was quickly closed.”
Though the sentence contains 37 words, and several events, the meaning is set in the first three words:
“Rebels seized control…”
“Think of that main clause as the locomotive that pulls all the cars that follow,” suggests Clark.
- Use active voice
Most writers prefer active voice.
Typically, sentences in active voice are clearer and shorter.
But how do you root out passive voice?
Here’s a few tips from the University of Wisconsin’s Writing Center:
- By phrases (e.g., by the customer) usually mean the sentence is in the passive voice
- If the subject anonymous, try to use a general term at the start, e.g., “researchers found…” instead of “it was found that…”
Start writing better sentences today
Our readers are busy people. Blogs, social media updates, and daily obligations compete for their attention. By expressing our ideas simply, we make it so much easier to engage with our content.
For more on writing clearly and simply, check out these strategies.
Photo by Hannah Olinger on Unsplash
