Really creative writing

Politicians who are in favour of mass immigration sometimes advocate the argument that `we (meaning the entire population) are a nation of immigrants.’
A pro-immigration member of the British government recently used this argument and I believe that it has also been used as an argument by pro-immigration politicians in the United States. But before I analyse (ok, I confess, tear apart) this `nation of immigrants’ notion let me make it clear that I don’t have a problem with controlled immigration and I’m not a racist.
But what I do have a problem with is governments that try to persuade myself and millions of other people that something is true when in fact it isn’t true.
The statement `we are a nation of immigrants’ patently means that everyone who is a citizen of that nation is an immigrant. So someone whose ancestors settled in that nation a few centuries ago is still an immigrant.
My ancestors settled in England 300 years ago. Your ancestors might have settled in America 100 years ago, 200 years ago or maybe you are descended from the colonists that settled in America in the 1600’s.

Either way, according to this political dictat, we are still immigrants. Nothing has happened since our ancestors first arrived in England or America. I am transfixed in 18th century England, when according to family folk lore my ancestors emigrated here from Holland, and you are transfixed in 17th, 18th or 19th. century America, when your ancestors might have arrived in America from the British Isles, Germany, Italy, Poland or Africa etc.
This transfixation could create real problems for me - and it could also create problems for you. I’ll have to start thinking traditional Dutch windmills rather than wind-farms, and wooden clogs rather than loafers. Currently pretty fun-loving, I’ll have to adapt to the Dutch Reformed Church’s idea of fun. Can’t wait.
If you aren’t too au fait with your ancestry you’ll just have to do a little research, or maybe take a chance, just kind of look like an immigrant - wear a frock coat, stove pipe hat and park a covered wagon in the drive.
I realise that political speech-writers, memorable-phrase-machinists etc. have to be brief when they create their slogans, but would it really be so difficult to create a slogan that is brief and accurate?

by Paul Gooch, may only be reproduced with the permission of the author.

Quite often writers are fascinated by a phenomenon - by an event which is so unusual they feel they just have to write about it. They might not have a storyline to wrap around the phenomenon and they might not have any characters to wrap around it but in their view that’s irrelevant at this stage, they can be created laterThis is the situation which I am in with the phenomenon of smokers and non-smokers effectively being segregated at certain times of the year but being allowed to integrate at other times of the year.
To explain, in Britain smoking is banned in bars and pubs. British smokers have to smoke outside, and they usually do this in `smoking shelters’. These are quite similar to bus shelters, they have a roof and walls but there are no doors and there is always a gap between the walls and roof, to allow the cigarette fumes to disperse.
Some smoking shelters are pretty basic while others are more comfortable; they might have seats, overhead electric heating and a TV screen showing football (soccer) games or rock videos. Many pubs also have gardens or patios. Smoking shelters are popular in the winter months but are hardly used during the summer months when it’s usually warm enough to go into the garden or patio and smoke.
Here’s the first draft of the story: `In the summer months the smoking shelter was deserted. Smokers had no need to shelter there, it was warm enough to sit in the pub garden and smoke. Non-smokers liked to sit there during the summer months too, so this was the migratory season, the kind of migration where herds of the same species, who have spent the winter in different locations, briefly migrate to seek better grazing.’
In the next part of `Problem story’ I’ll take a closer look at the phenomenon of writers being fascinated by a phenomenon but having little idea what to do with it, and hopefully I’ll find a solution for the problem, a solution which may help you if you are ever in this kind of situation.

.

One of the main aims in article writing is to write the article in a `fluid’ style - in a way that makes it easy for the reader to read the article. The opposite of a fluid style could be called a `hesitant’ style.
The paragraph above has (hopefully) been written in a fluid style but let’s change it slightly and use it as an example of a hesitant style. Probably the easiest way of doing this is to insert a comma where a comma isn’t necessary. Unnecessary commas are one of the most obvious symptoms of a hesitant writing style.
Let’s re-write it like this: `One of the main aims in article writing, is to write the article in a `fluid’ style - in a way that makes it easy for the reader to read the article.’
If you place a comma after `one of the main aims in article writing’ you are giving your reader a chance to absorb the fact that there are several aims in article writing. You are being considerate towards him.
The problem with this attitude is, he might not want you to be considerate towards him. He might resent it, he might feel that you are patronising him - calling him stupid.
Analyse yourself for a moment. Be honest with yourself. Maybe there’s some truth in this, maybe you are patronising him, maybe you are calling him stupid.
But the (relatively) good news is that if you are doing this it almost certainly isn’t deliberate. It’s because you are playing safe, it’s because you are taking into account the fact that he might be `stupid’, that it might take him a few seconds to absorb the fact that there are several aims in article writing.
The reason for this attitude is, you don’t know what kind of person he is. You don’t know if he is the kind of person that can grasp new ideas immediately or if he is the kind of person that needs a few seconds to grasp new ideas.
The (genuinely) good news is that you aren’t alone. Writers never know what kind of person they are writing for. They might have some idea about this, but they can never be sure.
In a future article I’ll look at some ways of approaching - but not necessarily solving - this problem.

* Why fandango? The fandango is a dance of courtship. Fluid writing is also a kind of courtship - you are courting your readers, dancing around them with a writing style which they might or might not appreciate. Actually I just like the way that fandango sounds.