The Discerning Reader [Writing]
"As newspapers and magazines become more obsessed with shorter, breezier stories and visual gimmickry, readers adopt that sensibility as normalcy. We are losing the ability to understand anything that's even vaguely complex." – Chuck Klosterman, Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs As someone knee-deep in the publishing industry (I'm a publishing executive in the editorial department of a media group here in Malaysia, which, in short form, means that I have my nose buried in all aspects of publication), I nodded so vigorously at this essay by Klosterman. Here's a typical instruction given to our business- and lifestyle-magazine writers all day everyday: "Write smart, write the kind of articles that you want to read. Our audience is sophisticated, intelligent, and very discerning. State everything clearly so that you don't lose your readers. They don't want to have to read complicated sentences, or encounter uncommon words." What this means to...