On Speaking Well by Peggy Noonan

Author:Peggy Noonan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-10-17T16:00:00+00:00

Y OU H AVE TO B E T OUGH

You want to consider the person you’re writing for ruthlessly. Is this somebody who’s aloof and needs to be warmed up with a piece of homey phrasing, or whatever? Is it someone who could surprise an audience by using very clear and analytic language?

But whatever moderating stylistic device, it will only work if it’s plausible, if it’s true of them or true of some facet of them.

W HEN Y OU’RE D ONE WITH THE S PEECH

Here’s what always happens. You’ve read what they’ve given you, you’ve talked to them about what they want to say, you’ve thought about how to synthesize all the data, you’ve written the speech they said they want, you give it to them, and here’s what always happens:

They look at it… and only then do they focus. The tactile fact of holding it in their hand and reading it with their eyes produces the moment at which they decide what it is they want. This, in my experience, is universal. It’s a prolonged or extended version of what happens when you go shopping. You want a black dress with a V neck. But you go to the stores, go through the racks, and you never walk out with what you wanted. You looked and changed your mind.

A politician tells you he wants a duck. Then he looks at it and says, “Uhhh, I wanted a chicken.” He’s thinking, It’s poultry, it’s related. But it’s not what he asked for.

Or another version: He tells you what he wants, you take careful notes, you organize the material, you put it into his language, you know you captured both him and his thoughts, and you give it to him… and he is disappointed. Why? Because it sounds just like him!

He wanted to sound better. In fact he does, but he can’t tell. In fact, he wanted to sound like someone else, and thought it was your job to make him into someone else! He thinks you didn’t do any work! He thinks you just wrote what he told you!

And so he’s disappointed.

And what you do in all these cases is… go back to the computer. Rewrite.

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