Sometimes, the writing that is hard-worked looks beautiful, mildly interesting but never exact. An ideal reader looks for few details in the entire 60,000 word novel or the 2000 word piece, and that is story and how well it is managed without afflicting it.

The most necessary detail to observe while writing is that you should never utterly confuse the reader. A reader’s mind is fragile. He is quick as the words flow under his eyes and a picture is slowly being screened in his mind. But if a disturbance in the flow arises, the reader tries to wait for the turbulence to sustain and if it carries on even a while longer, he’ll feel tired and he’ll shut off that flow and go back to sleep. Your partner is bored. You were impotent.

Let’s imagine a plausible sentence – “The apple is red.” The same can be written in many a ways according to the writer’s intellect and preferred style. For instance, a good writer might write just exactly that – “The apple is red.” A writer who writes for himself might write – “The apple is brick-red, like hue in a twilight cloud.” There is nothing grammatically wrong with the sentence or with the structure. It is perfectly germane. The ‘wrong’ thing here is that it is clarifying when it should be just stating. Clarification is needed when the situation isn’t intelligible by the word only. Good writingshould point out and not reach that terminal. Can’t understand? Allow me.

A man is hunting in the woods. He has his faithful Labrador by his side. They spot a winter-dyed rabbit. Instead of pointing at the bunny, Bruno scampers and takes a bite out of it. It defies the whole purpose of the dog. Instead of pointing (stating), it is eating it (clarifying it). I repeat: good writing should point out and not reach that terminal, because loss of exactness can destroy the rhythm, little by little.

Writing is a blend of time management (movement), bad prose (foreplay), good prose (rhythm), language (sensitivity) and story (climax).

Time Management:

Being realistic, I would say that time has nothing to do with writing in particular. You have to devote possibly all of what you can afford to spare. Every time you write and give it a hundred percent, you’ll improve indefinitely because there is no labeled margin, as such, that mars the progress of a writer. There is a simple theorem to success in life: ‘Hard work.’ There is also a simple theorem to success in writing: ‘Unrelenting hard work.’

Bad Prose:

Bad prose is unidentifiable. It needs a very sincere, persevering eye to spot it. It’s like finding tiny specks of blue ink on a black cloth. Bad prose is almost inconspicuous to the writer’s eye; but they do the required damage to the story, all the same. It is the husk on the corn, the unnecessary stuff that can be done without. Observe this small para –

“The wind was leathery. It howled and screamed, drawing black. Darkness combed like poetry, little by little, mounting the sky and reeling before a star, like the million leaves that tend to sew in and out a bark’s height. My eye skimmed the window across, washing it with sight. Time was unessential, old and religious, but still, I somewhat liked her to be punctual. And she stood there. Not a breath late.”