On Writing Well | 动词的力量

印象_xingxing 2015-06-16

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On Writing Well 这本书已经和大家推荐过许多次了, 不过我相信会去看的人一定还是不多的－'能写清楚就不错了, 不指望写的多well'. 这本书本身的写作风格和语言都是范文之作, 举的例子和一些心得也对我们的英文写作&赏析有很大的帮助.

因此我打算重读一遍这本书, 把一些实用的，有启发性的文章段落分享给你.我们不可能读完这本书一下子就醍醐灌顶,妙笔生花.但是至少我们会对英文语言和写作有更深的认识.

这本书在国内亚马逊售价70左右, 你也可以通过其他渠道购买. 买一本好书随手翻翻是值得了. 当然了你也可以去在网上搜到电子版(别告诉我你搜不到). 顺便说一下搜索资料的一个小技巧, 无论是google 还是baidu，在搜索的时候加上扩展名例如“On writing well.mobi' 'here is new york.pdf'这样会更容易搜到. 要善用搜索,善待资源. 换换关键字,了解一下搜索技巧 -- 别在百度上没搜到就理直气壮的说网上没有.

或者留言给我你的邮箱地址, 我发给你好咯. (不推荐)

Bits and Pieces |

Use active verbs unless there is no comfortable way to get around using a passive verb. The difference between an active verb style and a passive-verb style—in clarity and vigor—is the difference between life and death for a writer.

“Joe saw him” is strong. “He was seen by Joe” is weak. The first is short and precise; it leaves no doubt about who did what. The second is necessarily longer and it has an insipid quality: something was done by somebody to someone else. It’s also ambiguous. How often was he seen by Joe? Once? Every day? Once a week? A style that consists of passive constructions will sap the reader’s energy. Nobody ever quite knows what is being perpetrated by whom and on whom.

I use “perpetrated” because it’s the kind of word that passive-voice writers are fond of. They prefer long words of Latin origin to short Anglo-Saxon words—which compounds their trouble and makes their sentences still more glutinous. Short is better than long. Of the 701 words in Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, a marvel of economy in itself, 505 are words of one syllable and 122 are words of two syllables.

作者William Zinsser 有一篇对哥伦比亚新闻学院国际学生的一次讲话,叫 “Writing English as a Second Language” (阅读原文查看). 最后他说:

“Repeat after me:
Short is better than long.
Simple is good. (Louder)
Long Latin nouns are the enemy.
Anglo-Saxon active verbs are your best friend.
One thought per sentence.'

Verbs are the most important of all your tools. They push the sentence forward and give it momentum. Active verbs push hard; passive verbs tug fitfully. Active verbs also enable us to visualize an activity because they require a pronoun (“he”), or a noun (“the boy”), or a person (“Mrs. Scott”) to put them in motion. Many verbs also carry in their imagery or in their sound a suggestion of what they mean: glitter, dazzle, twirl, beguile, scatter, swagger, poke, pamper,vex. Probably no other language has such a vast supply of verbs so bright with color. Don’t choose one that is dull or merely serviceable. Make active verbs activate your sentences, and avoid the kind that need an appended preposition to complete their work.Don’t set up a business that you can start or launch. Don’t say that the president of the company stepped down. Did he resign? Did he retire? Did he get fired? Be precise. Use precise verbs.

If you want to see how active verbs give vitality to the written word, don’t just go back to Hemingway or Thurber or Thoreau. I commend the King James Bible and William Shakespeare.

George Orwell在 Politics and the English Language中,以 “翻译” 圣经传道书中的一段话(Ecclesiastes 9:11)来展示英文“糟糕英文”.

King James Bible:
I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.

我又转念，见日光之下，快跑的未必能赢，力战的未必得胜，智慧的未必得粮食，明哲的未必得资财，灵巧的未必得喜悦，所临到众人的，是在乎当时的机会.

Modern English of the worst sort:
Objective consideration of contemporary phenomena compels the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.

第二种英文尽管被Orwell称之为“最差劲的那种”，但其实是我们经常会读到的“学术性”文章－高大上的GRE之流. 学术研究之类的讲究客观和事实, 但是这不意味着所有的写作就应该如此。好的写作是让你觉得有人情味,在和你讲话一样。这样的例子可以翻一翻Amazon上的买家评论, Goodreads上的“读后感”.