Alright! You have a Masters in English Lit’. And you have consistently scored high marks in university. And yes, yours was an English medium!
Yet you are no where near landing that perfect job or even if you are, you are being subjected to endless rewrites.
Are you wondering why?
Well have you ever asked yourself whether you have enough of the English language in you?
Have you ever stopped to think that maybe, just maybe, your language skills may not have developed that extra something that’s needed to be a writer?
A good writer is refined, fluent, articulate and grammar perfect on paper.
Are you?
Yes the words might flow and you know the language- but do you know it well enough- to write it well?
Are you one of them?
Recently newspapers were flooded with advertisements that read-
“Stop why you are in so hurry” it can cause loss of life”
It only goes to show how badly language standards have fallen that it could escape the eagle editing eye of editors
or
are you one of those who finds nothing wrong with it?
It highlights the apparent verb/preposition confusion evident in the writer’s mind.
Whatever! There can be no excuse for such mistakes and mistakes they are if you knew your language and its grammar well.
You don’t become a writer by just stringing all the words you know any which way either. It only comes across muddled, convoluted and verbose.
No, you become a good writer by knowing how to use the right words and the right tools-in this case grammar- in the right manner to convey your ideas/thoughts.
One with the language
In order to write well a writer needs to have a certain feel for the language. A sense of total identification with its various nuances, its uses.
She needs to hear it, speak it, and think it often enough to be able to write effortlessly in it.
It also needs to have been taught well.
Even though English is the common language of connect in India it is increasingly becoming just one among several languages.
So there is this tendency to absorb the local flavor more often than not thereby robbing it of its original accuracy.
Many new add-ons and out and out mistakes creep in and become the norm, making it easy for the reader to spot a non native, non proficient writer immediately.
So however much you read, listen to lectures or imitate the best speakers if you do not have your fundamentals in grammar clear, you are in big trouble.
One small insignificant ‘ing’ or ‘on’ in the wrong place could spell finis to any promising writing career.
Therefore it is important to revisit your grammar skills every once in a way if you find yourself often on the slippery end of the writing pole.
Grammar
So check out your apostrophes (its /it’s), your punctuation (the panda eats, shoots and leaves!), your articles (the, a, an,), along with your spellings, prepositions and verbs constantly till it becomes an inalienable part of your thinking/writing process.
You need to have the right amount of the language well entrenched in you before you can become a good English-language writer.
That in short is what differentiates a good writer from a bad one or even a mediocre one.
But if you are happy with a ‘we are like this only’ kind of take it or leave it attitude…then don’t be dismayed if ‘leave it’ is what happens to you.
- Sreelata Menon
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Comments:
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I am guilty of using grammar inappropriately, this article is an eye-opener.
Though my clients like my writing style, most of my articles are sent back for re-writing because of grammar mistakes. Can you please let me know how to present error free writing?
“Enough English?” Groan!
Evidently, even “good” Indian writers aren’t so good, are they?
@Rasna: Were those two of your “little” questions? Thank heavens you asked them.
@Madhuri: Sorry, I laughed while you groaned.
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