To kick off 2024 with a burst of color, I’ve brought together half a dozen of my favorite newsletter posts from the past two years, pairing them up for shared conversations under the theme of writing with pleasure. Each pairing ends with a question: What does pleasurable writing look like for you?

You may wish to complement today’s post with the daily prompts of my 30 Days of Writing with Pleasure challenge, now on Day 8 (but it’s not too late to join us!). Then, on February 1, segue into #AcWriMoments 2024, a series of monthly writing prompts co-curated with my friend-in-writing, Margy Thomas. Our open-doored theme for January 2024 is WELCOME.

Enjoy!

The Pleasures of Wordcraft

In the first of these two posts on the pleasures of close reading, I use colored highlighting to analyze (with pleasure) a piece of writing by master stylist Steven Pinker; in the second, I conjure a multilayered collage from the words and images of a Wordsworth poem.

Savoring good writing or exploring unknown paths: which mode of discovery speaks to you?

These next two posts explore how metaphorical language can inspire and empower academic and professional writers. The first takes you on a joyride through my various publications on writing and metaphor — a theme I can’t seem to escape from! — while the second offers a glimpse of what awaits you in the metaphor-rich landscape of my upcoming Pleasure Catalyst.

Past research or future learning: which direction will the metaphor bus carry you next?

The Pleasures of Be-ing

And finally, here are two contrasting takes on be-verbs. The first plies you with stylistic strategies for avoiding forms of the verb to be, while the second urges you to ignore such bossy syntactical pronouncements and have some fun.

Well-meaning Bee or contrary Cat: whose advice will you follow?

In case you missed my announcement last week: this year I’m scaling Helen’s Word back to one post per week, alternating between newsy newsletters, craft-based essays, and new episodes of Swordswings, my monthly podcast for paid subscribers.

I love hearing back from my readers! Please leave a comment, share this newsletter with a friend, drop me a restack — or at least toss a heart into my crazy weaverbird-mountain-bus-hands-bee-cat collage (which was a lot of fun to pull together).

Kia pai tō koutou rā (have a great day) – and keep on writing!

Subscribe here to Helen’s Word on Substack to access the full Substack archive and receive weekly subscriber-only newsletters. WriteSPACE members enjoy a complimentary subscription to Helen’s Word as part of their membership plan (USD $15/month or $135/year).

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Just two months after launching Helen’s Word on Substack, I’ve found that locking away my essays and experiments behind a paywall doesn’t sit well with me — so I’ve flung the gates of my Writing Garden wide open. Even if you’re a free subscriber, you can now find the full texts of all recent posts on my Substack homepage and here on my website blog.

To my precious paid subscribers, including my entire WriteSPACE community: thank you for your continuing support!

Moving forward, I plan to publish a series of monthly podcasts called “Swordswings”: short, easy-to-digest audio snippets in which I’ll address readers’ questions about writing and wordcraft. My very first Swordswing, coming up in early October, will respond to a query from Stephanie, a PhD student in Art History in Australia:

I am looking for some exercises / information / instructionals on how to write good transitions: I particularly struggle with the transitions between the big movements in my argument and sections within chapters. I am keen to read or watch any articles, books, etc that you could recommend.

These podcasts will be available to paid subscribers only. There are three ways to get access:

1. Sign up for a monthly or annual paid subscription to Helen’s Word ($5/mo or $50/yr).

2. BEST VALUE: Sign up for an annual WriteSPACE subscription ($150/yr), which includes unlimited access to hundreds of extra writing resources, weekly prompts, live workshops, and exclusive tools, all for just $12.50/mo.

3. Sign up for a monthly WriteSPACE subscription for $15/mo, or $45/mo if you choose the premium WS Studio plan. Click the button below for a free 30-day trial.

I’d love to see you there on the other side the playwall.

Be dramatic!

This week, in the “Be dramatic” module of my 6-week Creativity Catalyst, we’ve been playing with ways of bringing dramatic elements and techniques such as dialogue, roleplay, and theatrical staging into our daily lives, our writing lives, and our personal and professional writing.

I’ve been laughing out loud (and sometimes crying, too) reading the brilliant experiments that the course participants have been sharing in the online forum. It’s been so inspiring to watch these brave academic and professional writers pushing themselves so far outside their creative comfort zone!

Imagine presenting the Results section of your design education article as a series of children’s games from a Brueghel painting; or exploring theories of identity via a creepy carnivalesque drama dubbed Identity Theatre; or staging a conversation at a philately conference between stuck-up characters called General Duffer and Dr. Smartyskirt.

Pam, a social work researcher in Australia, was generous enough to allow me to print in full a satirical piece that she wrote, as she put it, in “a moment of frivolity” while responding to a Creativity Catalyst prompt called “Stage a Scene”:

Write about your research in the form of a screenplay or stage script. Describe the setting, props, and costumes; write dialogue for your characters; specify stage directions, camera angles, lighting, and sound effects. What famous actors would you recruit to play the lead characters in the movie of your research? Could it be adapted into a Broadway musical?

Enjoy!

STAYING ALIVE: A comedic drama in one part

Setting

A cold hard pavement near a busy road. Discarded papers blow about in the gritty breeze. Laughter, singing, shouting, and occasional applause can be heard intermittently in the background.

A thesis (dissertation) lies gasping on the footpath. People rush past on either side, intent on their own research, teaching, service . . . barely pausing to notice the near-death experience happening at their feet.

Soundtack

The soundtrack to this scene is “Staying Alive” by the Bee Gees. The Bee Gees have been around for a long time and some of the group have passed into a different life, and yet they still have some influence. It is not accidental that First Aid teachers use this track to help people learn the correct rate of compressions in CPR.

Props

The set is sparse and unwelcoming. There are few props — just a battered rubbish bin and a single streetlight. The set's colour scheme is monochromatic, inspired by brutalist architecture in many shades of grey.

Costumes

The thesis is wearing a royal blue coat, with silver details and a classy ribbon that matches the coat. Pam is in her pyjamas from waist down, but wears a neutral top and has brushed her hair and applied just enough makeup to keep people from telling her she looks tired. The First Aid team (Helen, Amy and Victoria) are in exuberant contrast: they are wearing bright colours, streamers and ribbons in their hair, with dramatically confident stage makeup. The cast of onlookers who stop to offer assistance are a varied bunch, their costumes ranging from tender pinks to vivid purples, one cast member in artistic black setting off the bright burnished orange of another’s outfit.

Lighting

The action takes place in the glare of the single streetlight, with the background movement taking place in subdued shadows.

Staging

The audience is seated a little distance away from the stage, grouped in various seating positions, and looking up at the elevated ivory-hued stage. A long delay occurs between the curtain going up and the start of any action, and the audience becomes restless. A few start to move towards the door, having little patience for academic/dramatic processes.

Scene 1

[The thesis is lying awkwardly on the pavement, one arm raised to attract attention, while shadowy crowds bustle to and fro in the background.]

Thesis (gasps): Help! Help! Please, someone...down here. I can’t hold on much longer.

Pam: Oh my goodness, it’s you! Thesis! What happened!

Thesis: I’m getting old and frail. I haven’t been getting enough sunlight. I haven’t had much exercise and I’m suffering from neglect, as you can probably tell. Where did you go?

Pam: I got caught up in marking! I feel so bad about this, but I had to earn a living, and, academia, you know . . .

[Pam clutches her pearls]

Thesis: Hack, cough, splutter.

Pam: Someone! Call an ambulance! There isn’t much time!

[Pam remembers her own phone, and dials frantically.]

Thesis: I’m so glad you’re back, though. If I don’t make it, promise me you’ll do something with our work. All those parents who shared their stories . . .

Pam: No, you mustn’t talk like that! We can still get something happening. I just need some fresh ideas.

Thesis: Maybe we should try to . . .

[The thesis collapses in Pam’s arms.]

Pam: No! I won’t let it happen! I will resuscitate you!

[In the distance, approaching sirens can be heard.]

Pam: Someone help! Why isn’t anyone paying any attention?

[A bystander pauses and speaks in Pam’s ear.]

Pam: Yes, yes, I know the marks are due in tomorrow. I know the university’s international ranking depends on student experience. I know I need to respond to the staff satisfaction survey and give my email address on the last page and of course I’m confident that all data is treated with the utmost confidentiality and no adverse employment consequences will occur. But Thesis is dying here! Help me roll it on to its back and start CPR!

[The bystander shakes their head sadly and moves back into the crowd. At this moment, an ambulance screeches to a stop at the edge of the stage, and Helen, Amy and Victoria jump out.]

Helen: It’s ok, we know what to do. Amy, Victoria, bring the tools!

Pam: Oh my goodness, how colourful! How vibrant! I feel a new energy. I might even break into dance!

[Other Creativity Catalyst classmates emerge from the crowd. One offers refreshment. Another calls encouragingly from the sidelines. A third passes a new tool to Helen and the group cheers.]

Thesis: Wha..? Where…? Who…? Oh, I’m feeling a little better. The creative energy is reviving me! Pam, we should start to work together again!

[The cast line up across the stage and in unison strike a pose, pointing with one extended arm to the sky. They break into song.]

All: Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Staying alive, staying alive! Ah, ah, ah, ah, staying aliiiiiiive!

[The curtains close, to rapturous applause.]

You may have recognized several of the characters in Pam’s drama as members of my indomitable WriteSPACE Team. My only disappointment is that Freddie, our Cuddles Manager, didn’t get to join us to help save the day.

This post was originally published on my free Substack newsletter, Helen’s Word. Subscribe here to access my full Substack archive and get weekly writing-related news and inspiration delivered straight to your inbox.

WriteSPACE members enjoy a complimentary subscription to Helen’s Word as part of their membership, which costs just USD $12.50 per month on the annual plan. Not a member? Sign up now for a free 30-day trial!

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On September 13, I invited Jane Rosenzweig, Director of the Harvard College Writing Center, to join me for a lively conversation on "Writing Critically with AI".

In the first hour of this free WriteSPACE Special Event, Jane and I discussed the risks and rewards of writing and teaching writing in the age of generative AI. In the second hour, we led a hands-on discussion and workshop for WriteSPACE members, digging deeper into some of the questions addressed in the first hour.

Here’s WriteSPACE Event Manager Amy Lewis’ personal account of the live event:

……………

This popular live Special Event featuring Helen Sword and Jane Rosenzweig offered a thought-provoking and insightful journey into the world of Generative AI and writing. Or should that be GenAI versus writing? While the jury may still be out on the impact that new AI writing tools are having on authors, students, and teachers, this in-depth conversation afforded a great opportunity to hear both sides of the debate.

Some memorable quotes from Jane:

• We survived Facebook, which was born and raised at Harvard while I was there … Then things were peaceful for a while, and now we have ChatGPT.

• I started becoming quietly horrified by myself at my computer. And I kept thinking, I need to write about this, look what this can do!

• Just because you can outsource your writing to a machine doesn’t mean you should.

Now that artificial intelligence is competent enough to research and write — and grade — for us, can we all just head to the beach? Jane and Helen were pretty clear that before you don your bikini, it’s important to consider the repercussions. Writing helps us develop critical thinking skills; so writers (particularly student writers) who use AI text generators may be missing out on learning those crucial skills.

Helen and Jane expertly weighed up the benefits and drawbacks of generative AI, which I’ve cut into bite-sized morsels for you.

The good news!

1. If you know how to be cautious about fact-checking the content, GenAI tools can play great research assistants. They deliver shortcuts to obtaining key facts and summarizing long passages into helpful abstracts, and they excel at writing very plain business emails and strategies (helpful for writers who want to prioritize their time so they can focus on more creative tasks).

2. For teachers, the conversations around ChatGPT can spark debate and challenge students. GenAI also offers opportunities for collaborative work, illuminating discussions, and comparisons of writing styles.

The bad news:

1. Students are using these tools for things like brainstorming, style edits, and even, in the most alarming cases, for drafting work that they intend to pass off on their own. If they haven’t yet learnt the skills necessary to critically assess the output, they may produce work that is less creative, nuanced, unique, or even accurate than what they could and should have done on their own (ChatGPT is notorious for “hallucinating” and falsifying quotes!)

2. Is GenAI really ethical? In simple lay terms, large language models use algorithms that function a bit like predictive text messaging, using large data sets to predict the most likely answers. But we don’t know much about how these GenAI systems are trained. Which part of the internet is their training data coming from? Because companies like OpenAI are not disclosing this information to us, there is a risk that serious violations of copyright are being perpetrated by the bots — to say nothing of their perpetuation of cultural biases and stereotypes.

3. These systems require tons of water to be powered, quite literally! For each conversation of roughly 20-50 questions and answers, ChatGPT needs to 'drink' a 500 ml bottle of water. Now imagine the water usage with billions of curious users. What’s more, the servers are often located in countries that can’t afford to see their water supplies depleted so drastically. Check out this article for more.

4. The human labor training element of GenAI systems is often outsourced to developing countries where workers experience unfair working conditions. Jane recommends the recent New York Magazine article Inside the AI Factory.

And if that’s not enough to contend with already, here are a few more unsettling questions for the future:

• Can ChatGPT get a kind of mad cow disease for chatbots? As the chatbots pump more and more material into the body of sources that ChatGPT is drawing on, the range and quality of the new content will likely degrade. ChatGPT will eventually start consuming its own content (the only kind of recycling I’d hate to see, and one that is already starting to happen).

• We unconsciously suggest that these bots have intelligence when we say ‘ChatGPT told me…” Is it helpful to anthropomorphize these machines? Should we be calling this technology cute nicknames like ‘ChattieG’ and ‘Claude,’ or should we refer to chatbots generically as ‘artificial text predictors’? Jane recommends Dr Emily Bender’s linguistic take on this question; check out her podcast Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000.

• Do people want to consume creative content (like TV or films) that is generated by AI? What does this mean for artists and designers? What new laws will be needed to protect creatives’ intellectual property? On a broader scale, will jobs be lost to AI? Or will they just become more alien and tedious? Will we need to implement a universal basic income in the future?

In the second hour of this intriguing session (for WriteSPACE members only), we delved into practical problems faced by writers and teachers alike, with Jane providing her insightful expertise as a professor who tackles these problems on a daily basis. Colleagues ask her questions such as the following:

• “As head of the department, I’ve got to take a stand on GenAI; what should I advise to the faculty?”

• “How can I ensure that students know the dangers of using these tools for their assignments?”

• “What is the difference between plagiarism and GenAI text?”

A big thank you to Jane and Helen for this informative and thought-provoking Special Event, and thank you to all the participants for sharing your positivity and unique opinions. For more of Jane’s insights, subscribe to her newsletter Writing Hacks.

See you again at the next event!

………..

WriteSPACE and WS Studio members can now watch the recording of the full two-hour in their Video library.  

Not a member? Register to receive an email with a link to the video of the first hour.

Better yet, join the WriteSPACE with a free 30 day trial, and access our full Library of videos and other writing resources.

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I’ve borrowed today’s title and tagline (“What poetry brings to research writing”) from two of my favorite books:

• Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us by Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross (Random House, 2023)

• What Poetry Brings to Business by Clare Morgan (Univ of Michigan Press, 2010)

The poetry snippets in my paper collage come from an Academy of American Poets calendar that I cut up several years ago; a quick Google search reveals the poets to be, from top to bottom, Brenda Shaughnessy, Erica Hunt, and Marcelo Hernandez Castillo.

In a fascinating overview of recent neurocognitive research on how poetry affects the brain, Magsamen and Ross observe:

A poem that truly resonates with us does so at a neurological level by stimulating the areas of the brain that are associated with meaning-making and the interpretation of reality. Poetry, at a cognitive level, can help us make sense of the world and consider our place in it. (Your Brain on Art, p. 79)

This week in the “Play with Poetry” module of my Creativity Catalyst, I’ve been encouraging writers from a wide range of disciplines and genres to incorporate poetry into their daily lives, their writing lives, and their personal and professional writing. The excitement amongst the participants has been palpable. When we contemplate our academic research (or anything else!) through the opaque-yet-clarifying lens of poetry, we discover things that we didn’t know we know.

One seasoned scholar — a public health researcher — experienced an intellectual ephiphany when she composed her very first research poem:

This week's exercise caused my office desk sparkling fireworks, that's how it felt. While I was thinking and writing a poem! about public health expenditure! I could feel the sparks coming out, like from the friction of two radically different and strong metals. [The] two different sides are the technical/academic and sentimental/poetic sides of me. And I’ve never cared to join them, thinking they were so different.

Another reflected on the cognitive value of compressing complex ideas into poetic language:

I think poetry is a form of writing with great benefit to academic writers. Condensing our ideas is difficult, especially the more complex they are. But the more complex, the more we need to be able to condense them. [Poetry] can help us with understanding our main point, generating important words, and redrafting our thoughts into a clear point that the reader will appreciate.

As promised, I’ve been playing along with this week’s poetry experiments. Below are two of my own research poems, along with the prompts that generated them. Try them out for yourself if you want to see fireworks sparking from your writing desk — and your writing brain!

Looking for more inspiration? Check out last year’s poetry experiments in the 2022 Creativity Catalyst Showcase….
Enjoy!

1. To My Darling Research

This week in my Live Writing Studio, I asked the participants — an eclectic group of writers from across the disciplines and around the world — to introduce themselves by holding up to the camera an interesting object found on or near their desk. Here’s the list that we collectively generated (you can probably guess which item was mine!):

Freddie the fluffy dog, koru (fern frond) earrings, shiny phone, tiny elephant, sprig of rosemary, red coin purse, a pack of cards, driftwood collage, hand cream

Next, I asked them to describe their current writing project in the Zoom chat and to explain why it interests or excites them. Finally, as a creative warmup before we turned to our “serious” writing, I prompted them to draft a short poem about a person, object, or topic central to their writing.

The Prompt

(Note: If you’re not an academic researcher, feel free to replace the word “research” with “writing.”)

1. (2 minutes) Jot down a list of objects that you see around you in your writing space — or, better yet, ask someone else to generate a random list of concrete nouns for you.

2. (3 minutes) Describe your current research topic. What are you writing about, and why? What interests or excites you about your topic?

3. (5 minutes) Write a poem addressed to a person, object, or topic central to your research, starting with the words, “To My Darling ___________.” For an extra challenge, incorporate some or all of the objects on your list into your poem!

The Poem

I’m not currently working on a research project myself, so I decided to write instead about my online writing community, the WriteSPACE.

TO MY DARLING WRITESPACE

You’re my daily companion,
the fluffy white dog snoozing by my desk.
You unfold like a koru,
a spiral of awakening.
You sharpen my senses
like a sprig of rosemary.
I play you like a pack of cards,
carry you around like a coin purse.
You whisper in my ear like a shiny phone
and soothe my cracked spirit
with the healing handcream
of community.

Wild and serendipitous as driftwood,
you’re bearing me away to someplace new —
but where?

In your presence,
I feel as shy and brave and certain
as a tiny elephant.

2. Research Haiku

My friend and colleague Margy Thomas, founder of ScholarShape, encourages academic writers to identify the “Story-Argument” that underpins their research. A few years ago, while I was working on my book Writing with Pleasure, I wrote a 5-7-5 syllable haiku summing up the Story-Argument of each of my chapters, plus the preface, introduction, section headings, and conclusion. So here it is: my entire book condensed down to a sequence of 15 haiku!

The Prompt

Choose a meaty piece of prose such as a book, a chapter, or an article, then express its main idea as a haiku: 5 syllables / 7 syllables / 5 syllables. For a further challenge, commit to using only concrete language — no abstractions. Taking a fractal approach, you can repeat this exercise for every chapter of a book, every section of an article, or even every paragraph or sentence of a complex argument.

The Poem

WRITING WITH PLEASURE

Preface: Why Pleasure?

Writing with pleasure
is better, wouldn’t you say,
than writing with pain?

Introduction: The SPACE of Pleasure

I’ve laid out this book
as a pleasure smorgasbord
for you to feast on

PART I: Pleasure Principles

Social, Physical,
Aesthetic, Creative,
Emotional: SPACE!

Chapter 1: Society and Solitude

The social pleasures:
society, solitude,
and intimacy

Chapter 2: Body Basics

Physical pleasure:
writing bodies revel in
senses, motion, place

Chapter 3: On Beauty

Aesthetic pleasure: 
beauty in writing about
beautiful writing 

Chapter 4: The C-Curve

Creative pleasure:
cognition, challenge, and choice
are the waves we ride 

Chapter 5: States of Mind

Writing emotions:
passion, playfulness, and praise
hatch happy penguins

PART II: Pleasure Practices

Find joy in writing
through tools, processes, cultures,
and a balanced life

Chapter 6: On the Ground

The hand on the page,
the page in the book, the book
in the hand: delight!

Chapter 7: In the Sky

Skytools, skywriting,
skyspace – but still we long for
flying unicorns . . .

Chapter 8: Wind, River, Stone

How can we channel
whirlwind and wordflow into
lines written in stone?

Chapter 9: Star Navigation

Follow your own star;
share your food; strive to be both
teacher and learner

Chapter 10: On the Island

Rest in the hammock,
surf in the waves, but write in
the littoral zone

Conclusion: The SPACE of Writing

Grounding, broadening,
deepening: let’s make SPACE for
writing with pleasure!

There’s so much more that I could say here about research poetry! These two poems were never intended for an audience; my purpose in writing them was to open my mind to a deeper understanding of my topic. But poetic inquiry is a well-established research methodology in its own right, supported by a robust body of scholarly publications that employ poetry as a mode of data collection, argumentation, presentation, persuasion, and more.

This post was originally published on my free Substack newsletter, Helen’s Word. Subscribe here to access my full Substack archive and get weekly writing-related news and inspiration delivered straight to your inbox.

WriteSPACE members enjoy a complimentary subscription to Helen’s Word as part of their membership, which costs just USD $12.50 per month on the annual plan. Not a member? Sign up now for a free 30-day trial!

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My beloved Creativity Catalyst course is now underway, and I’ve decided to play along — that is, I’m planning to try out some of my own writing prompts each week here in my paywalled garden. Each of the six weekly modules poses a creative imperative that I’m eager to heed:

1. Tell your story

2. Play with poetry

3. Be dramatic

4. Move around

5. Make stuff

6. Mix in metaphor

It can be scary, I know, to send your writing experiments out into the world for other people to see. But that’s exactly what I’ll be urging the Creativity Catalyst participants to do week after week, albeit within the safe space of the course’s gated membership area (and only if they want to) — so I’m going to walk the talk and join the vulnerability parade.

This week, I skipped ahead to Week 5 and mashed together two prompts, called “Juxtapositions” and “Layerings,” to create my paper collage for this post. The many juxtapositions and layerings of imagery, color, and form — apples, stargazer lilies, golden orbs, an ornate garden gate, a ready-to-bud David Hockney tree — are still jostling and settling in my mind. Perhaps my rough-but-resonant composition is emblematic of the Creativity Catalyst itself, with its gated content and disruptive energies? Or maybe it gestures towards a liminal moment of arrival and entry? I guess I won’t know until I write about it. . . . 

But let’s not go there today. Instead, I invite you to accompany me on a quick guided tour of the marvelous Creativity Catalyst Showcase that we assembled at the end of the course last year — or you can check it out on your own. Warm thanks to Amy Lewis for curating the Showcase and to all the amazing participants from around the world who granted us permission to exhibit their writing experiments in public. 

Intrigued? Inspired? There’s still time to join this year’s Creativity Catalyst! Why not treat yourself and your writing to an eye-opening, intellect-sharpening, soul-expanding elixir of creative joy?!

Step into the Showcase

To get the most from the Creativity Catalyst Showcase, I recommend that you click into each of its six Galleries in turn and spend some time exploring the exhibits there.

But life is short and we’re all very busy, so I’ve selected one exhibit from each of the galleries to highlight here — making some tough choices along the way, as there were so many treasures to savor. Enjoy!

Tell your story

The Story Gallery showcases some of the powerful non-fiction produced by Creativity Catalyst participants when they brought core elements of storytelling such as character, setting, and plot to their academic and professional writing.

Emily (USA) used the genre of detective fiction to revise an article on the challenges of learning to meditate:

I liked the idea of “Detective” as a genre. The original article says:

“At first we engage with our practice through words, yet, in no time at all, discover words are not enough. The Zen student finds they are being asked to hear meaning with more than just the ears, and somehow produce an answer beyond words.”

My first stab at a detective-like feel was:

“The student eyed the teacher warily. It seemed like this standoff had been going on for years. In fact it had — though this particular battle was only moments in the making.”

But since this doesn't say enough to resemble the original article I added more details:

“The Zen student eyed his teacher warily. The scent of incense hung in the air in the small, softly lit space. It seemed like this standoff had been going on for years. In fact it had — though this particular battle was only moments in the making.”

Play with poetry

The Poetry Gallery demonstrates how writers from any discipline or genre can use poetic language to think more creatively, write more vividly, and connect with their readers more effectively.

Vanessa (Switzerland) wrote this evocative poem as a tribute to her years of fieldwork in Ghana:

SALT

Chains on a vessel
He skips a beat
It’s just... you know... back in the day
Now it’s fish they ship away
A pool of blood
A moonless night
Such tenderness
Your light shines bright
The open sewer
The tuna stench
Their graceful posture
My back on that bench!
Mornings at the navy base
The fiery star’s hot kisses
Lucky me, I said – who said?
Theirs is work no one misses
Traffic, more traffic
The road never ends
Under the madman’s strict orders
The black man’s back bends
White skin, black magic
Whose photo is that?
Don’t try it with logic
Don’t eat that bat
Fieldwork is sweating
The big stuff, the small
It’s learning to sit with
The ache of it all
Fieldwork is heart work
Sometimes it’s fun
And always in Ghana
The sun, the sun.

Be dramatic

In the Drama Gallery, you’ll find an array of experiments with dramatic techniques such as dialogue, scriptwriting, and role-playing, all aimed at uncovering the human heart of a story.

Jasmine (Aotearoa New Zealand) brought in visual elements to ramp up the drama, “staging a scene” both figuratively and literally:

This created image was inspired by one of Helen’s experiment prompts: “Regulars in a Bar” could possibly show my struggle of diving into the various philosophical worlds for my PhD study. Instead of imagining those representative figures of different schools gathering in my mind, I decided to visualise them and let them have some “real” fun together while enjoying the alcohol. The incongruous splendour reflects the collision and confluence of varied ideologies.

The figures from left to right are Nietzsche, Adorno, Foucault, Marx, Barthes, and Derrida. By the way, the name of the bar is “Soul.”

Move around

The Moving Gallery, as its name implies, is a place of motion and emotion where writers move their own bodies through space and nudge their readers into new ways of thinking.

David (Norway) was inspired by this week’s prompts to highlight the sensory details in a series of interviews with victims of violent crime:

Memories were often expressed in visual terms: “What I remember is the tragedy […], a city in flames and constant alarm. A time of not knowing when there would be another attack, another bomb; the sensation of going out in the streets and finding corpses lying there” (male schoolteacher, late 40s).

Memories were also connected to sound: “there was the noise of the bombs and the ambulances around the city all the time; there was constant tension” (taxi driver, early 50s). Smell also played a significant role in the accounts of direct witnesses: “I remember going to school […] and there were corpses there, I could smell the blood, but I had to keep walking because I did not want to see if the body was of someone I knew” (unemployed man, early 40s). Intertwined with memories of suffering were recollections of considerable economic activity: “a lot of pain, a lot of fear, many murders, but also a lot of money” (housewife, late 60s).

Make stuff

For the exhibitions in the Making Gallery, participants turned off their digital devices and got out paper and scissors, colored pencils and glue. They let their hands tell them what and how to write.

Catalina (UK) used the intersecting genres of paper collage and poetry to reflect on the interplay of mapping, making, and emotion in her disciplinary area of urban planning:

Maps cultivating gut feelings

Writing as storytelling
Connecting the emotions of the mundane

Writing as visual poetry
Layering meaning and beauty

Writing as dramatic plot
Revealing the epic tensions of everyday

Writing as embodied movement
Dancing lines of thought

Writing as metaphorical craft
Turning lame into velvet

Writing, a golden thread stitching
the hand playing with shapes and images

the heart beating words

the mind weaving ideas

the body breathing meaning

Mix in metaphor

In the Metaphor Gallery, we witness vivid demonstrations of how metaphors can convey complex ideas to readers and help writers re-story their own emotions.

Patrick (USA) used the metaphor of boxing to reflect on his own fraught relationship to the writing process:

When I am writing at my best, I would say I am a boxing contender on the night when they become champ. The document is an opponent that has possibly underestimated just how prepared I am for the moment. I am walking my opponent into the punches I want to throw. I am not reacting but rather I am dictating the terms of engagement. I am leading the dance so to speak. To think about the metaphor during times when I am not writing well, I am just reacting. I am being walked into traps—traps in the literature and traps in the individual sentences. It is at those points that I am not quite clear how I got into a corner and I don’t know how to get out. I am fighting at my opponent’s pace, while I can win fight their pace (getting something written that can be published), I am not usually pleased with the outcome. I only got stuff done but I did not necessarily excel. . . . When I am loving writing, I am in a groove. I am seeing the punches before they are thrown. I am able to side-step and account for anything that is thrown at me. I am also able to riff. When I get stuck writing, I have the most success when I go back to the basics. In boxing, it’s how do you throw a 1-2 or a jab and right hand. When I am stuck, it’s about getting back to writing simple but clear sentences.

This post was originally published on my free Substack newsletter, Helen’s Word. Subscribe here to access my full Substack archive and get weekly writing-related news and inspiration delivered straight to your inbox.

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Word-nerd that I am, I love taking sentences apart to figure out how they work. 

Stephen Pinker calls this process “reverse-engineering” and recommends it as an effective — and highly pleasurable — way to hone your sense of style:

Writers acquire their technique by spotting, savoring, and reverse-engineering examples of good prose. . . . Savoring good prose is not just a more effective way to develop a writerly ear than obeying a set of commandments; it’s a more inviting one.

(Steven Pinker, The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person's Guide to Writing in the 21st Century). 

In a new series of posts subtitled “Spotlight on Style,” I’ll be inviting you from time to time to savor some stylish sentences and paragraphs with me. We’ll look at how they work, why they work so well, and what we can learn from their vocabulary, structure, and syntax. 

I’ll also shine some light on the stylistic foibles of ChattieG, aka ChatGPT (with continuing thanks to Inger Mewburn for this resonant moniker). 

As acronyms such as LLM (Large Language Model), GenAI (Generative Artificial Intelligence), and ChatGPT (Chat Generative Pre-Trained Transformer — yes, really!) worm their way into our collective consciousness, we need to find ways of treading lightly but carefully among them. I’m here to help!

If you have an example of a stunningly stylish sentence or an egregiously awful paragraph that you’d like to put to the Sword (so to speak), please contact me with the text, and I’ll consider using it in a future post.

This week’s Spotlight on Style features a paragraph by literary historian Gillian Beer about the revolutionary impact of major scientific theories — a beautiful example of clear, concrete, carefully paced academic prose. ChattieG’s version? Not so much…

Gillian Beer on the impact of new scientific theories

Most major scientific theories rebuff common sense.  They call on evidence beyond the reach of our senses and overturn the observable world.  They disturb assumed relationships and shift what has been substantial into metaphor.  The earth now only seems immovable.  Such major theories tax, affront, and exhilarate those who first encounter them, although in fifty years or so they will be taken for granted, part of the apparently common-sense set of beliefs which instructs us that the earth revolves around the sun whatever our eyes may suggest.

(Gillian Beer, Darwin’s Plots: Evolutionary Narrative in Darwin, George Eliot and Nineteenth Century Fiction)

Academic writers often assume that abstract thought demands abstract language.  Literary historian Gillian Beer lays that misconception firmly to rest.  In the opening paragraph of Darwin’s Plots, a study of the relationship between nineteenth-century science and literature, she vividly describes how scientific theories rebuff, call on, overturn, disturb, and shift other forms of thinking; they tax, affront, and exhilarate the people who encounter them.

Beer packs plenty of abstract nouns into this paragraph – theories, common sense, evidence, reach, relationships, metaphor, beliefs – but takes care to balance them with appeals to sensory experience: senses, world, earth, sun, eyes.  Her writing helps us see how ideas and theories can take on energy and agency, a life of their own.  

Beer’s attention to style is evident also in the structure and pace of her prose.  She starts off the paragraph with a short, compact sentence (7 words) followed by two slightly longer ones (15 and 12 words) and another very short one (6 words).  Then, just as we are getting used to her almost staccato rhythm, she tosses in a long, sinuous sentence (47 words) that requires us to concentrate in quite a different way.

[Excerpted from Stylish Academic Writing, p. 50]

ChattieG on the impact of new scientific theories

New scientific theories have a profound impact on people, triggering curiosity and discussions. They prompt us to reevaluate our beliefs, fostering intellectual growth and technological innovation. However, they can also create uncertainty, challenging norms and encouraging adaptation. Overall, these theories catalyze personal and societal transformation, promoting ongoing learning and evolution.

In response to my prompt, “Write a paragraph on the impact of new scientific theories,” ChattieG initially delivered a paragraph containing 141 words, significantly baggier than Beer’s slick 87-word paragraph. “Make it half as long,” I commanded. (I’m gradually learning to resist my impulse to beseech ChattieG with a polite “Please can you?”)

The resulting 50-word paragraph — apparently Chattie G doesn’t know how to count! — is syntactically unimpeachable but stylistically bland.

Like Beer, ChattieG grants agency to abstract ideas by positioning scientific theories as the grammatical subject of all four sentences and ascribing to these theories an array of personified behaviors: they trigger curiosity, prompt a reevaluation of beliefs, fosterintellectual growth, catalyze transformation, and promote ongoing learning even while also creating uncertainty, challenging norms, and encouraging adaptation. But what I miss here is the sense of surprise and delight inspired by Beer’s less predictable verb choices — rebuff, overturn, tax, affront, exhilarate — which have clearly been drawn from the fertile brain of a voracious reader and wide-ranging thinker, not from a chatbot’s online word bank of frequently-used academic verbs.

I also miss Beer’s musical sense of rhythm and flow, as evidenced by her virtuosic transition from short staccato sentences to sinuous legato prose. All four sentences in ChattieG’s effort have essentially the same length (11 to 14 words) and structure: “[Scientific theories] [verb] [object], [verb]ing [object] and [object].”

When asked to revise their original 50-word paragraph to include a mix of short and long sentences, ChattieG punched up the word count from 50 to 83 and nudged the shortest-to-longest-sentence ratio from 11:14 to 9:20 — still a far cry from Beer’s spectacularly varied sentence-length ratio of 6 (shortest) to 47 (longest) in a single paragraph.

ChattieG gets drunk on Beer

Large language models like ChatGPT are pretty good at producing coherent, well-structured prose formulated in short, actively phrased, easy-to-read sentences. There’s a chronic lack of character, and you’ll need to do some fact-checking; but the structure and syntax aren’t bad.

When you ask a chatbot to write in a more poetic, playful, or individualistic style, however, the systems go haywire. Here’s what happened when I directed ChattieG to rewrite their original 50-word paragraph in the style of Gillian Beer:

New scientific theories possess an innate power to disrupt established modes of thought, provoking a symphony of curiosity and discourse. As these nascent ideas unfurl, they unfailingly beckon us to recalibrate our cognitive compasses, leading to a nuanced cultivation of intellectual expansiveness and technological marvels. Yet, interwoven within their intricate tapestry is an undeniable current of uncertainty, inviting us to traverse uncharted waters and redefine the boundaries of convention. Such theories, orchestrating a dance between upheaval and adaptation, ultimately choreograph a ballet of personal and societal metamorphosis, an evergreen ode to perpetual learning and growth.

Our eager writing assistant extols the virtues of “perpetual learning and growth” but has apparently never learned about the dangers of purple prose. In this hodgepodge of metaphorical nonsense, nascent ideas unfurl and beckon, intricate tapestries are interwoven with the currents of uncharted waters, and scientific theories orchestrate dances and choreograph ballets, which eventually metamorphose into evergreen odes.

“In the style of Gillian Beer?” Hardly. But good for a laugh.

ChattieG as sonneteer

Speaking of falling over laughing, I’ll end with ChattieG’s Italian sonnet on the impact of new scientific theories:

New theories in science, a realm profound,
With power to shift established thought's embrace,
Ignite our minds and spark a vibrant chase,
In quest of truths, in depths yet to be found.

They urge us to reevaluate the ground,
To shed old skin and seek a higher space,
Innovation blooms, a swift-paced race,
Yet uncertainty can often then abound.

Amidst this dance of change and adaptation,
We find a symphony of transformation,
A call to learn and grow, a ceaseless flow.

These theories, like a river's endless tide,
Guide us along life's intellectual ride,
In quest of knowledge, ever on we go.

Can someone please teach ChattieG how to scan?!

This post was originally published on my free Substack newsletter, Helen’s Word. Subscribe here to access my full Substack archive and get weekly writing-related news and inspiration delivered straight to your inbox.

WriteSPACE members enjoy a complimentary subscription to Helen’s Word as part of their membership, which costs just USD $12.50 per month on the annual plan. Not a member? Sign up now for a free 30-day trial!

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