Continuing on the value of condensation.
From an 1899 book Making a Country Newspaper:
= = = = = START QUOTE:
Newspaper English to be good must be simple and concise. Clearness and brevity of statement are all-important. This does not imply that the narrative should be limited to a few facts. On the other hand, every fact must be stated or the story will not be clear. But the facts should be stated in the fewest and simplest words.
Every sentence must add a fact to the narrative. If it adds but one fact it is all the stronger. In walking we take one step at a time. It is exceedingly awkward and laborious to attempt to take two. Do not make your readers feel that reading your paper is like making an effort to walk by taking two steps at a time.
“Marley was dead” is much stronger and impressive standing alone than it would be if several other facts were tacked to it.
Space should not be occupied that can be filled with more important matter. It costs money and takes time** to put unnecessary words in type. Then comes the expense of paper and ink to print them. And think of the time the reader wastes. The writer should bear in mind that the average newspaper reader has but little time to give the paper. In that time he wants to get the most out of it. The careful writer can save twenty percent of valuable space by a pruning of superfluous words, and intelligent condensation, without sacrificing an essential fact.
A good newspaper article must not only contain all the facts, but these must be so arranged that the narrative will be striking. The reader’s curiosity must be aroused in the first paragraph, or he may not read what may prove to be an important article. More ingenuity is required to write the first paragraph of a newspaper story than to write a column of what may follow.
= = = = = END QUOTE.
** I think this may be the key to the modern problem.
Designers and writers do their best work when faced with serious constraints on budget and materials. When money is no object, the result is uniformly awful.
The production end is essentially costless now. There are no intermediate stages between writing the word and distributing it to the masses. No dictation, no typesetting, no compositor, no electrotype or stereotype, no press run, no collation, no delivery.
When I hit PUBLISH here, it’s done and delivered in a split second. I don’t need to deal with a proofreader or a linotypist or a pressman, so there’s no negative feedback loop for verbosity or incoherence.
The consumer end has NOT changed. The reader of text or the appreciator of art or appliances still has severe limits on budget and time and attention, so the designer should give due regard to those constraints.
Polistra's Mill 