The War of Art: Winning the Inner Creative Battle
by Steven Pressfield

Pressfield is the author of several bestsellers. The War of Art is a 12 step self-help support group for procrastinators, a biological and psychological disection of procrastination and your own personal writer's side-kick in the war against procrastination all in one short text. Pressfield calls the cause of procrastination resistance. Resistance is the voice inside your head, the one that tells you you'll never make it, you're going to fail. Resistance tells you that you NEED to watch the next episode in your TV show, NOW; that going shopping IMMEDIATELY is more important than sitting down to write your dissertation. Pressfield takes resistance apart, explains it in clear language and explains how to overcome it. The book is a quick read. Reading War of Art won't satisfy resistance and as soon as you read the book, resistance is going to kick into high gear with long discussions of why it's important to, well, do whatever it is except get up and do what needs doing, powdermilk. 

Resistance is that thing that makes us read tons of Andy Gelman blog posts instead of working on our next paper. Blogging could arguably also be a form of resistance. I prefer to think blog-keeping is my way of staying sane and cataloging a few of my semi-great thoughts for my future students to hear. Are you listening, future students? Hear hear! And more importantly, blogging is my way of practicing writing on a frequent enough basis to grease the mental writing wheels. 

The War of Art title harkens back to The Art of War by Sun Tzu, available for free on most fine digital reading platforms in multiple versions. I've yet to make it even partway through Sun Tzu's book, but I made it through Pressfield's book in a few bus trips in to work. 

Resistance is feudal. [I've always wanted to write that.] It holds you in fief, and demands you do anything but what is important. 

I'll keep this review short. Be done with your blog reading. NOW. STOP READING THIS BLOG! Go do something you aspire to. If something is holding you back, that something is resistance. Read The War of Art and get yourself on track. 

This is the first of perhaps three short book reviews. 

Certain basics of writing I go over with almost every student. Organization, content, paragraphs and sentences. Roy Peter Clark's Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer covers most of the them. Clark is an entertaining writer and this is a highly enjoyable read. It's worth reading as literature, even if you aren't in the market for improving your writing. This is highly recommended for beginning professional writers. That includes beginning statisticians like my students and continuing statisticians like myself. 

There are four major parts: Nuts and Bolts, Special Effects, Blueprints, and Useful Habits. Each part contains from 10 to 16 short chapters each presenting a different 'Tool'. As I read, my head kept nodding up-down, yes-yes, uh-huh, yep, told so-and-so that at our last meeting, made those comments yesterday to such and such. Roy Peter Clark presents the tools more succinctly, colorfully and intelligently than I can. He's got more tools than I have and they are ordered, cataloged and polished; I learned a lot!

One strength is that he presents his advice as tools, not as rules. Rules suggest hard and fast brook no prisoners strict laws. A tool is adaptable to many different situations. A tool helps, rules restrict. 

Nuts and Bolts gives expert guidance on writing strong sentences. Less is he explaining common mistakes and more on how to avoid the mistakes in the first place. This is material I spend a lot of time on with my students. Begin sentences with subjects and verbs (Tool 1); place strong words at the beginning and at the end (Tool 2); strong verbs create action, save words (Tool 3). Those are the title, subtitle, and part of the subtitle for the first three tools. Clark crystallizes rules I didn't realize I knew, and adds to the tools I have for writing and for advising students. Clark explains when to use passive voice -- virtually every student starts writing too much passive voice. Some students were taught to use passive in scientific writing (didn't that advice die decades ago?). Students write in passive voice when they are unsure of what they write; they try to distance themselves from what they have written. 

Fear not the long sentence (Tool 7) is advice I usually can't use, but set the pace with sentence length (Tool 18) prefer the simple over the technical (Tool 11), in short works don't waste a syllable (Tool 37) are very appropriate for scientific writing. Prefer the simple over the technical has the subhead: Use shorter words, sentences and paragraphs at points of complexity. This is great general advice as well as great specific advice for any given sentence as technical writing is almost always quite complex. Get the name of the dog (Tool 14) is about supplying informative details -- something that virtually all students do not understand until taught. That model you just presented: tell us what it does, how it works (data in, inferences out, but how?), and why it is needed (What's so great about it?)! 

Other tools would never have occurred to me, but are quite valuable. Save string (Tool 44) talks about saving up little ideas, thoughts and data until you have enough for a paper. I've been doing that, sometimes for decades, but didn't have a name for the behavior or a way to even think about the behavior. Some tools I should engage in but haven't: Recruit your own support group (Tool 47) I should do more of, while (Tool 41) turn procrastination into rehearsal, is my excuse for every delay. Some tools are better for fiction and newspaper writing, but they're fun to read and think about and may be utile even in scientific writing. Tool 26, use dialogue as a form of action talks about how the eye is drawn to short sentences with lots of white space -- advice I promptly used in advising someone preparing presentation slides. 

Tune your voice (Tool 23) I took to heart as advice to me about advising my students: let my students find their own voice. Similarly, limit self-criticism in early drafts (Tool 48) is vital for getting the meat of a project on paper before tightening up language and organizing the content. Too much criticism to early and the creative brain shuts down and that segues into my next review. 

I strongly recommend Peter Roy Clark's Writing Tools, 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer to every graduate student and to any professor who wishes to improve their writing. 

This from Dr. Robert Bolan of the LAGLC. 

I agree with Rob’s choices of writing references. Strunk & White and Zinnser are indispensable and, perhaps not so surprisingly, they are written well enough so they actually can be read and not only used as quick lookup sources. Of course there are others but these are touchstones of proper English grammar and word usage.

So much of good writing, as Rob suggests, is trying to achieve absolute clarity with the words you choose and how you string them together. Economy is a sacred principle in good writing. Use the right words and use as few as possible. Also, rearrange sentences to get the flow right. For guidance on these skills I like Getting the Words Right: How to Revise, Edit & Rewrite by Theodore A. Rees Cheney. For assistance in technical writing there are several references. I like Merriam-Webster’s Manual for Writers & Editors. For sheer brilliance and clarity of advice, check out Robertson Davies’ Reading and Writing, a slim volume you can read in two or three sessions (read slowly, let sink in, do not gulp this one down). And finally, I offer my fervent belief that scientific writing, although requiring parsimony and precision, need not be dry and devoid of style. Read anything by John Gardner on writing, Stephen King on writing, Eudora Welty on writing, or any novelist or essayist whose style you admire. And then when you’re done with all that, read Paradise Lost—aloud—not for comprehension but for the sheer thunderous music of it. Philip Pullman, who wrote the introduction to my edition of Milton’s masterpiece, remarked that "the experience of reading poetry aloud when you don’t fully understand it is a curious and complicated one. It’s like suddenly discovering you can play the organ." You will likely be thinking that poetry has nothing to do with scientific writing. I disagree. All writing exists for the purpose of communication. Again, scientific writing need not be sterile—although that often appears to be the gold standard for editors. If you have something important to say, you must say it clearly, of course. But cadence and musicality, sparingly used, can deliver your meaning with an elegance that will, unbeknownst to the reader, nestle it into place with crystal clarity. Compose, don’t just write.

Obsessive attention to nuance and detail in writing can be a curse as well as a virtue, and every true writer can identify with the following. A friend of Oscar Wilde’s is reported to have asked him what he did yesterday.  Wilde replied: "In the morning I took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back in again."

Me again regarding this last: A wonderful short essay on being too critical of yourself early in the writing process is Gail Godwin's The Watcher at the Gate. 

In technical writing, three terms/phrases not to be used:

• Intuitively, ...
• It is clear that ...
• It is obvious that ...

Just as well you could write

• Any idiot can plainly see ...

These phrases may be true for you, the writer. However, the reader won't have your depth of understanding of the subject matter and especially of the current notation and material. When the reader does not find the truth as plain as the unvarnished nose on your face, using these phrases directly affronts dear reader. As figure 17 plainly demonstrates both to the unaided eye and to any imbecile, obviously you shouldn't use these phrases. Even my pet gerbil knows using these phrases will insult anyone with a kindergarten education and clearly get your paper rejected posthaste.

Acknowledgments: I first heard this advice indirectly from Don Berry via a student taking a course from him. Berry gave extensive feedback on a writing assignment. The 'even my pet gerbil knows' phrase is courtesy of Andy Unger, MN chess expert. 

I'm editing a generally well written, near-final draft of a biostatistics paper. Worth broadcasting are several writing problems that occur in almost all grad student writing. 

• Don't denigrate your contributions. 
  • Original: A simple way to achieve this ... 
  • Edit: A way to achieve this ...
  • Comment: Be respectful of your contributions. Are you so close to your own solution you can't see how important it is? Perhaps you've forgotten how innovative your solution was, given how long you've been living with it. Modesty, either real or false is not rewarded in academia. Besides, if you're really a scientist (and you are if you're a statistician), honesty is an important characteristic. Being honest about the importance of your work may not be easy, but it is important. Your work may be mathematically simple, but if you describe your idea as simple, readers will assume you meant that the idea is trivial.
• Don't represent,
  • Original:  ... [statement of key idea] because this represents [key idea alternative] ...
  • Edit: ... [key idea] because this is [key idea alternative] ...
  • Comment: Represents is wishy-washy and could imply any of a number of relationships. Be firm. If A and B are the same thing, say A is B, not A represents B. 
• Use the same language every time. ​
  • First Original: dispersion around $x$
  • Second Original: dispersion
  • ​Edit both times: dispersion around $x$ 
  • Comment: Apparently in the original text, there can be more than one dispersion.  Describing the dispersion as "around $x$", implies there are or could be other kinds of dispersions not around $x$. Thus the need to keep the modifier in repeated useage.  
• Plot don't Show
  • Original: Figure 2 shows ...
  • Edit: Figure 2 plots ...
  • Comment: Or: Figure 2 is ... . Figure 2 doesn't show anything if you're not well enough educated to understand the plot in the first place. Figure 2 contains the plot, but Figure 2 doesn't show anything. 

To my wonderful students: These paragraphs are a revision of advice recently given to a student writer. 

Writing is a craft we all must master. And we all will. You are young: enthusiasm and energy come through in your writing: keep that and add to it. Become a better writer by growing as a writer and as a person. It took me time to become a decent writer. I hope you become better than me, and in less time. Every paper, report, memo, email, text is opportunity: take it and become a better writer.

The best writing instruction ever: Good writing is bad writing rewritten. I got it from Stephen King. Where Stephen King got it, I don't know. I'm giving it to you. You tell your students.

Write your first draft. Now go back, edit and revise. Rinse and repeat. 

Academics must write with accuracy. Compulsively read and re-read each sentence you write and game the sentence: Pretend to be an intelligent reader, but ignorant of the background. Search for multiple interpretations. Many first drafts have multiple meanings. Then put your re-write hat on and fix the sentence. One sentence at a time. Ditto: Does this sentence say what you want it to say? Ditto: Does this sentence belong here? Or elsewhere in this paper? Or in a different paper altogether? 

Density. Good writing has high information content per word. Find the words that don't convey meaning and delete them. You can eliminate 10% of the words from a first draft. Now go back and eliminate another 10%. Have you said something before? Delete it.

Writing is work. Successful writing: a pleasure. 

Redundancy, duplication and reiteration are not desirable in technical writing. Assume your reader remembers everything previously written! 

1. You write "As mentioned before", "As previously stated", "From section X.X we know that" in a biostat paper or thesis proposal. 
   1. Continue writing. 
      1. It is okay to continue writing, because it is okay for you to write incorrectly or sub-optimally. 
      2. We all write sub-optimally.
      3. Get the words out, finish the draft. 
   2. It is permitted that your draft may be flawed. 
      1. The words on the page are just a draft and are not important. 
      2. The words on the page are not final yet. 
      3. Therefore it is okay to change the words. 
   3. It is not okay that the final version has major flaws.
      1. Bad writing will irritate your reader.
      2. Bad writing slows the reader. 
      3. Bad writing wastes the time of everyone who has to read your paper. 
      4. Fewer people will read your paper. You will have less impact. 
      5. If you are submitting a research paper to a journal, there will be serious consequences.
         1. At best, the referees will be irritated by the poor writing and make you revise it extensively. They may suggest rejecting the paper merely because of the writing. 
         2. At worst, the editor will reject the paper without even allowing referees to put their two cents in.
      6. Bad writing will be taken as a sign that
         1. You don't care about what you are writing;
         2. That you think the topic isn't important; or
         3. That you are a poor thinker.
      7. None of the previous item is true:
         1. You wouldn't be writing this if you didn't care,
         2. You wouldn't work on this topic if you didn't think it was important.
         3. You can't be that poor of a thinker, you got into graduate school for goodness sakes!
   4. Back to the business at hand. The current text is flawed. Make it better. 
   5. ​The text says the same thing in at least two places.
      1. The text is allowed to make a statement one time. The text is allowed to make a statement one time.
      2. If a statement occurs twice, there's a good chance it occurs three times. Or more. Check. 
      3. Which copy to keep? First (contact)? Second (base)? Last (supper)?​
         1. Is the statement needed at the first occurrence, or can it wait until the second? The best place to make a statement is the place where its consequences are utilized immediately which will leave hooks in the reader's memory to make recall easier. 
         2. If you leave the statement in place at the first occurrence, state it in a way the reader will recall at each spot without a restatement.
      4. ​Remove all but one copy of the statement. 
      5. Now your task is to make sure the reader will understand the text with the removal. 
         1. Repair the text in each place where you have removed duplicate text.
         2. Smooth and shorten. 
         3. Likely you will need to rearrange text, lots of text.
         4. Can the two or three locations be combined?
2. Often there are additional duplicates: text, phrases, definitions, statements.
   1. Scan through quickly for duplicates. 
   2. Identify an important phrase that you use several times. Use global search to identify every usage. At each use, does the text say the same (or similar) thing about or with it? 
   3. Go fix. 
   4. Reduce. Do not re-use. Do not re-cycle! 
3. A related writing problem is identified by the phrase "in other words". In other words signifies what we intended to write is important, but we're pretty sure the reader won't get it from the current set of words.
   1. There is fault here; the fault is in the initial phrasing.
   2. Thus we restate the point in other words, usually immediately in the next sentence.
   3. Solution: Typically the restatement is easier to follow so keep it and delete the first flawed version.
   4. Smooth your text.
   5. Have you omitted important information from the first statement? Is it really important? If yes, add it back. Tersely. But not the whole thing. 
4. Taking a break from writing if needed. 
   1. It's hard to edit immediately after writing until you've garnered some experience switching modes. 
   2. After 10 minutes of break, go back and edit to remove duplicates. 
      1. Until you are an experienced editor, going back and editing can be painful. But editing is as important as the initial writing. Even if you're not ready, go back and edit. 
      2. Get to it. 

Enjoy!