Closing Out the Year - - Becoming a Better Writer

The Internet has produced an era with a focus on writing - - from e-mail to blogs to reports to discussions - - the ability to write well is increasingly important.  The computer keyboard of the 80s with a "permission" key has been replaced in 2010 with a "publish" key.  This is important for engineers to understand - - to be a force on these very public written forums takes effective writing skills.  If you want the public to understand the issues associated with declining infrastructure or our energy insecurities requires the ability to communicate - - and communicate in a meaningful and thoughtful manner.  The beauty of engineering and technology is the content.  We have numerous great and interesting subjects we can write about.  They are interesting, important, and topical.  In this new era of the written word, it is important for some class of engineers to become masters of language with the ability to turn unassuming words into phrases that are convincing, effective, and memorable. 

Have a goal in 2011 to become a better writer.  Study the art of writing (reading is important - - superior abilities in both are highly correlated).  Start with the basics of rhetoric.  Rhetoric is a vast, old, and honorable discipline.  It may be defined most broadly and simply as the use of language to persuade or otherwise affect an audience.  Consider the following examples of rhetorical writing:

• Epizeuxis is the repetition of words consecutively.  O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo - - Romeo and Juliet.  Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!  I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb-nail - - Walden.
• Epimone is the repetition of entire phrases.  There is no retreat but in submission and slavery!  Our chains are forged!  Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston!  The war is inevitable - - and let it come!  I repeat it, sir, let it come! - - Henry, speech at the Second Revolutionary Congress of Virginia.
• Anaphora occurs when the writer repeats the same words at the start of successive sentences or clauses.  King's "I have a dream" speech utilized the phase at the start of eight sentences in a row.
• Epistrophe is the repetition of a word or phrase at the end of a series of sentences or clauses.  Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy; I knew Jack Kennedy; Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine.  Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy - - Bentsen to Quayle.  Churchill was the master of this.
• Symploce is the repetition at the start of successive sentences or clauses, and other words are repeated at the end of them, often with just a change in the middle.  I am not afraid of you; - but I am afraid for you - - Trollope.
• Anadiplosis is the use of the same language at the end of one sentence or clause and at the start of the next - - an ABBC pattern.  Society, dead or alive, can have no charm without intimacy, and no intimacy without interest in trifles which I fear Mr. Harrison would describe as "merely curious." - - Balfour.
• Polyptoton means repeating the root of a word with a different ending.  Judge not, that ye be not judged - - Matthew 7:1.
• Isocolon is the use of successive sentences, clauses, or phrases similar in length and parallel in structure.  Let every nation know; whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price; bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty - - Kennedy.
• Chiasmus occurs when words or other elements are repeated with their order reversed.  You were given the choice between war and dishonor.  You chose dishonor, and you will have war - - Churchill.
• Anastrophe is when words appear in unexpected order.  Yoda in Star Wars is the classic example.
• Polysyndeton is the repeated use of a conjunction.  Thus, then, though Time be the mightiest of Alarics, yet is he the mightiest mason of all.  And a tutor, and a counselor, and a physician, and a scribe, and a poet, and a sage, and a king - - Melville.
• Asyndeton means leaving out a conjunction where it might have been expected.  Drudgery, calamity, exasperation, want, are instructors in eloquence and wisdom - - Emerson.
• Ellipsis is an omission of expected words.  In short, had you cast about for a plan on purpose to enrich your enemies; you could not have hit upon a better - - Paine.
• Praeteritio occurs when the writer describes what he or she will say, and so says it, or at least a bit of it, after all.  I wished to show, but I will pass it upon this occasion, that in the sentiment I have occasionally advanced upon the Declaration of Independence I am entirely borne out by the sentiments advanced by our old Whig leader, Henry Clay, and I have the book here to show it from but because I have already occupied more time than I intended to do on that topic; I pass over it - - Lincoln.
• Aposiopesis is breaking off a sentence and leaving it unfinished.  Please take your electric light and go to - - but never mind, it is not for me to suggest; you will probably find the way; and any way you can reasonably count on divine assistance if you lose your bearings - - Twain.
• Metania is correcting oneself.  I am old and infirm.  I have one foot - - more than one foot - - in the grave - - Pitt.
• Litotes occurs when a writer avoids making an affirmative claim directly and instead denies its opposite.  But the Royal Navy has immediately attacked the U-boats, and is hunting them night and day - - I will not say without mercy, because God forbid we should ever part company with that - - but at any rate with zeal and not altogether without relish - - Churchill.
• Erotema is a question that does not call for a reply.  Is this, sir, a government for freemen?  Are we thus to be duped out of our liberties? - - Tredwell.
• Hypophora occurs when the writer asks a question and then answers it.  You ask, what is our policy?  I can say: It is to wage war, by sea, land, and air, with all our might . . . - - Churchill.