Dumbing It Down

[Selena_Kitt]

Everyone's given great advice, as usual...

I just wanted to come by and give Doc a

 

[Edward Teach]

Too many whats???

(Doesn't "poly-syllabic" mean a 3+ person marriage in eastern Europe?)

Safe, Safe, Safe. It has to do with a dirty mouthed parrot and just one little caress will get banned from Lit and trouble with the SPCA no matter how much the bitch asked for it.

Eddie the Encyclopedic

 

[Edward Teach]

I need some advice on how to dumb down a piece of non-fiction writing.

An editor told me my piece on Vampirism and BDSM needs to be toned down to make it more appealing and understandable to the average magazine reader, which in this case is the human vampire-wannabe market of (mostly) young adults.

Admittedly, these aren't Rhodes Scholars, so how do I make my stuff more magazine-friendly? (Admittedly again, I do tend to write like a pompous asshat.)

Here's some examples of the writing...

==============================

Vampires are sexy, we all know that. It's no secret that the mystique of the vampire is loaded with sexual imagery and symbolism. Bram Stoker's Dracula was published in 1897, at the height (or depth) of the sexually repressive Victorian Era, and in hindsight we can see that the sensation it caused was in large part due to its subtle but highly-charged erotic message. The public's fascination with a charming monster who lived in the darkness and fed on beautiful young (read: virginal) women in their beds doesn't need a Freudian to explain it.

Dracula was a sexual force, pure and simple, and, more specifically he was the very embodiment of the Victorian Era's fear of sex: something sinister, dangerous, and evil that made monsters out of men. Stoker's vampire was a creature of pure desire, pure blood lust, and his bite (often delivered in the victim's own bed), made helpless addicts of those unfortunate souls. Ever since Dracula, the themes of penetration, death, and erotic possession, run through vampire literarure like a sexual trinity.

How much of this Stoker took from actual folklore and how much he invented is open to debate, but consciously or unconsciously, he played up this sexual angle and in so doing came up with one of the most potent sexual icons of modern times: the vampire. No one today doubts that the Vampire's enduring popularity is largely due to his eroticism.

...

Eleven years before Dracula's publication, Austrian psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing published his groundbreaking Psychopathia Sexualis, the first scientific treatment of sexual deviance. It was this book that gave us the terms sadism, masochism, and the concepts that go with them. The names may have been new, but the concepts certainly weren't. That pain and cruelty bear some remarkable and often arousing relationship to sex is not the finding of any one people or time, but is the common experience of humankind throughout history and beyond. What's in dispute, though, even today, is just what the nature of this relationship is. Is pain a necessary part of the process, an unfortunate consequence, or even perhaps a kind of inducement or embellishment?

Personally, I like to be informed, whether I'm reading fiction or non-fiction, but it sounds to me like your publisher is afraid the audience will be turned off by the slightly pedantic beginning. I dunno, seems good to me.

 

[sr71plt]

In the publisher's defense, there's every reason to believe that they have a good understanding of the reading level of their demographic--and there ain't too many popular magazines set to the reading level of grade 12.7.

 

[vrosej10]

In the publisher's defense, there's every reason to believe that they have a good understanding of the reading level of their demographic--and there ain't too many popular magazines set to the reading level of grade 12.7.

I agree. When trying to get published it is essential to match the demographic of the magazine your trying to get published in. I think maybe your tone was too academic. Try reading the magazine in question and matching the "flavour". Most editors try to aim for a kind of uniformity throughout their publications. For what it's worth, I liked it.

 

[ishtat]

1 Read a Harlequin romance.
2 Copy for style/complexity.
3 Keep a bucket close by.

 

[Liar]

I don't see any problem with the text per se, but if you DO want it simplified, the key is to minimize the complexity and multi layering of the sentences and text chains.

"How much of this Stoker took from actual folklore and how much he invented is open to debate, but consciously or unconsciously, he played up this sexual angle and in so doing came up with one of the most potent sexual icons of modern times: the vampire."

This sentence is laden with conditions and caveats, in order to make it say precisely what you want it to say. The problem is that if I'm dumb, or just weary, I'll have to read it very slowly and think about what I read, and where in the substructure of phrases I am, while reading, to not lose you in a sharp turn.

Can it be structured differetly and still say the same thing? Let's take a look... What is the main core of this sentence?

...that we don't know how much Stoker took from folklore and how much he made up?
...or that he played up the sexual aspect?
...or that he may have done it subconsciously?
...or that this focus on sex lead to the creation of the vampire icon?

Right now I'm not quite sure.

Someone with a one-track mind or ADD might have a hard time with that. One argument at the time would ease up the denseness of the paragraph.

 

[CharleyH]

I feel for you, Doc, I really do. I think there is probably nothing worse than having to dumb down a good piece of writing, but on the positive side it is better that they asked you to dumb it down than to smarten it up, so don't feel too depressed I can't make an informed comment without knowing the magazine you're writing for, but for what it's worth ...

Can you save this piece to sell it to another magazine or maybe save it to make a book out of it? I, for one, would be interested in an intelligent article/book on this subject. Don't waste this (so far) great piece you've privileged us with.
DELETE - I obviously dumbed blonde on this one. Tried to help, sorry I failed, Doc. Keep your spirits. I know that you will figure it out.

 

[glynndah]

It sounds fine. Just break up the sentences a bit.


Vampires are sexy, we all know that. It's no secret that the mystique of the vampire is loaded with sexual imagery and symbolism. Bram Stoker's Dracula was published in 1897, at the height (or depth) of the sexually repressive Victorian Era. In hindsight we can see that the sensation it caused was in large part due to its subtle but highly-charged erotic message. The public's fascination with a charming monster who lived in the darkness and fed on beautiful young (read: virginal) women in their beds doesn't need a Freudian to explain it.

Dracula was a sexual force, pure and simple. More specifically he was the very embodiment of the Victorian Era's fear of sex: something sinister, dangerous, and evil that made monsters out of men. Stoker's vampire was a creature of pure desire, pure blood lust, and his bite (often delivered in the victim's own bed), made helpless addicts of those unfortunate souls. Ever since Dracula, the themes of penetration, death, and erotic possession, run through vampire literarure like a sexual trinity.

 

[WRJames]

Beyond the vocabulary and sentence structure, the mere fact that you are attempting to put forth an intellectual argument may be bad.

Does your audience know who Bram Stoker is, or what the Victorian era is? And that funny Latin title -- that's going to make them think they're in church or something.

Pretend someone invited you onto Fox News.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

ELLIOTT

The best book about vampires is VAMPIRES: The Occult Truth by Konstantinos.

He does a marvelous job covering the subject, and its a terrific reference that middle school kids and PhDs will profit from because it's easy to read for anyone with a 3000 word vocabulary.

'Elizabeth Bathory, known as the Blood Countess, was a mortal blood drinker who has also been immortalized in literature and film, although rarely accurately. Bathory was born in Transylvania in 1560...'

 

[tickledkitty]

Doc,

I like your writing, but you already know that. My first thought is that your editor may be underestimating his readership. Having met a few of them myself, or at least other folks of that ilk, I've been struck by their intelligence and sensitivity, not to mention their dedication to their...what? Craft? I dunno...whatever. At any rate, I'm thinking those demographics are wrong. I don't believe they're that young, and I don't believe they consider themselves "wannabes." They live the life, as you know. Please don't dumb it down so far as to insult their collective intelligence. I think there's too much of that already, and I think they are truly insulted by it, and rightly so.

So, that's my two cents, which doesn't get you around the editor problem at all, does it?

 

[sr71plt]

Unfortunately, that's not at the tippy top of responses to give an editor you're trying to sell a piece to, TK. Nice to see you posting, though.

 

[lesbiaphrodite]

At the risk of garnering disfavor by saying this, I will venture to make a remark that the initial question by the OP begs.

I consider the whole question as posed to be a right piece of presumption. The implication behind the entire question is that only dumb people like those other than yourself could conceivably tell you how to dumb down your 'article.'

Does it not occur to anyone besides myself that the whole question is an insult to the intelligence of those who post here?

I find it disgusting.

 

[oggbashan]

I don't think you'll attract disfavour. Yours is a reasonable opinion even if I disagree.

I think that writing "down" or writing for dumber people is more difficult than writing academic prose.

The best children's authors have skills and techniques to produce books for their target audience that will make the story live for that audience. The greatest ones write stories that appeal to the target audience AND to other audiences as well.

Writing to reach a wider audience than your intellectual peers is possible. It isn't necessarily easier, nor is it necessarily beneath your abilities.

I have considerable respect for the journalists who write for the UK tabloids/scandal sheets. They write to a house style; to a defined market and meet the needs of the readers almost perfectly. The journalists writing for the prestige newspapers can use long words, convoluted constructions, assume previous knowledge, can be verbose and sloppy yet they know their readership will understand. The tabloid journalist has to be direct and snappy, has to use a limited vocabulary and simple references to tell the same news story. They still have more freedom than a TV news anchor who must use short sentences and simple words to match the pictures.

Try comparing a news item in a major quality newspaper, a popular newspaper aimed at a mass audience, and a TV report. Usually the TV report will tell you far less than even the popular newspaper.

Look at the number of different stories in any newspaper. Compare that with the number in a half-hour TV news programme. Almost every newspaper will have three or four times as many stories as a TV news channel.

The techniques of presenting information have to vary according to the media and to the audience. There is considerable skill and a mass of knowledge required to master each different technique.

I could go on using advertising as an example. A simple TV campaign will have taken many person hours to plan and execute - for something you see for only a few seconds.

Dumbing-down needs intelligence and skill.

Og

 

[sr71plt]

I think you either misread the post you were responding to, Ogg, or you're being very, very nice in deflecting it.

 

[Liar]

At the risk of garnering disfavor by saying this, I will venture to make a remark that the initial question by the OP begs.

I consider the whole question as posed to be a right piece of presumption. The implication behind the entire question is that only dumb people like those other than yourself could conceivably tell you how to dumb down your 'article.'

Does it not occur to anyone besides myself that the whole question is an insult to the intelligence of those who post here?

I find it disgusting.

I went to college for three years to learn how to simplify language, straighten out disposition, weed out redundancy and axe the overbearing technocracy out of mine and other people's writing. I'm still learning, and discover new things about the nature of readability on a daily basis. Especially readability in the English language, where I'm a true novice.

So whatever Doc's premise and/or presumtion is, truth is it takes some brains, knowledge, experience and skills to "dumb it down" just right.

Note that he admits he "tend to write like a pompous asshat", so I don't see how he's condescending.

 

[ishtat]

My original reply was facetious. This time I will try to be more constructive.

Doc's editor expressed himself more kindly than perhaps he might have. He could easily have said "Doc this is a poor piece of writing . It doesn't speak to your audience.Try again."

The editor was right, it doesn't connect with the intended audience. The Doc was in his academic default mode. My solution would be to say 'take yourself out of that mode and imagine that you are telling this as a story to a person.' The shorter sentences and more direct language will flow. Do not think of it as "dumbing down," apart from being somewhat patronising it's just plain wrong. What is dumb, is to write an explanation which fails to communicate. Writing in the language of the audience is the smart solution.

It also got me thinking about some great authors. Mark Twain, Charles Dickens and Jane Austen are all examples of great authors who were great communicators who wrote for an audience and had the capacity of appealing to a wide audience. Note that two of the three were formerly journalists.

On the other hand George Eliot, Theodore Dreiser and Dostoyevsky are all regarded as great writers by the critics but who ever reads 'em. Who has actually finished "The Brothers Karamasov or Adam Bede and how many people can even remember anything the terminally tedious Dreiser wrote. Those guys wrote for themselves.

So in conclusion I can see where Lesbiaphrodite is coming from and whilst I think she greatly over-reacts, her comment does tease out the issue that the initial piece of writing wasn't up to scratch for the intended audience and Doc's editor was quite right.

 

[Weird Harold]

The editor was right, it doesn't connect with the intended audience. The Doc was in his academic default mode. My solution would be to say 'take yourself out of that mode and imagine that you are telling this as a story to a person.' The shorter sentences and more direct language will flow. Do not think of it as "dumbing down," apart from being somewhat patronising it's just plain wrong. What is dumb, is to write an explanation which fails to communicate. Writing in the language of the audience is the smart solution.

This is something that has been begging me to comment on, but I couldn't figure out how to do it politely.

"Dumbing Down is Doc's terminology, not his editor's. Writing to a more accessible reading level is NOT dumbing down your text, it is "smartening it up."

Any third grader with a decent vocabulary can write at a level that requires a post-graduate degree to decipher. One would expect a 12th grader to write better than a third grader who can string together twelve thoughts in one sentence.

A "reading grade level" rating of 12+ is not complimentary to the author because readability should be proportional to writing ability.

 

[lesbiaphrodite]

I went to college for three years to learn how to simplify language, straighten out disposition, weed out redundancy and axe the overbearing technocracy out of mine and other people's writing. I'm still learning, and discover new things about the nature of readability on a daily basis. Especially readability in the English language, where I'm a true novice.

So whatever Doc's premise and/or presumtion is, truth is it takes some brains, knowledge, experience and skills to "dumb it down" just right.

Note that he admits he "tend to write like a pompous asshat", so I don't see how he's condescending.

Well, I hold an advanced degree in English literature and have taught it at the college level, if you want to be braggardly about things, and though I, too, spent many years learning to simplify language and make it more readable, I would never be so bold as to call that 'dumbing it down' to anyone. I think Hemingway is a master of simplification, and it's hard work, but he was not an arrogant prick who bragged about the fact that he spent years learning to do so in order to make it easy for the dumb asses out in the world to read it. Neither he, nor any other writer worth his salt, would be so egotistical.

What I learned as a student and teacher does not give me the right to call others dumb or say that it's 'dumbing something down' when asked to simplify my writing.

 

[glynndah]

Wow! I must have totally misinterpreted what Doc asked.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

LEZ

I think youre forced to pare words down to the 3000 word window Robert Gunning identified as containing 98% of the words people use. The average Americano reads at an 8th grade level, and popular American authors and authorettes hold firm to this line (Twain, Bierce, Hemingway, Steinbeck, Lardner, Dreiser, Rawlings). Most women and the gelded guys like Updike fly a little higher into obscurity.

 

[sadangel]

I kinda of understand the problem DrM had with "dumbing it down" as I've had to do that all my life. That's what I call it. I was taught to not be as smart as I was, and as a result I'm not as smart as I once was. I lived with two different people in my life that when I would talk as I normally do, told me to say it in "plain English" so that their simple minds could understand. (Their words, not mine) so as a result, I learned not to talk in the manner that was once so normal to me. I am grateful that I now have someone in my life with whom I do not have to "dumb it down" and in fact, I think he'd be a bit ticked with me if I did. It feels good to talk and write the way that is my normal once again. It will take time to get there completly but that's okay.

I in no way consider the term, "dumbing it down" to actually be calling any one dumb. Perhaps one could say that I have had to simplify things, that however doesn't say what I am feeling. For me, it is myself that is being ridiculed, when I say I have had to "dumb it down."

 

[Weird Harold]

Wow! I must have totally misinterpreted what Doc asked.

Nah, you understood his question just fine, we're just objecting to his characterization of 'toned down to make it more appealing and understandable' as "dumbing down."

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Nah, you understood his question just fine, we're just objecting to his characterization of 'toned down to make it more appealing and understandable' as "dumbing down."

Lincoln and Douglas didnt tone-down their debates, but the expectations back then were different, and they didnt care if you were a Special Olympian with a trophy case filled with plastic ribbons and CareBear awards. I cant believe many pupils or perfessers get much from reading Lincoln today. It must seem like reading Chaucer in the original.