If you have learnt touch-typing or tested a keyboard or the font to use for readability, space usage and word count, you’ve probably typed this sentence: “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” It contains 35 letters, including the 26 letters of the English alphabet.
I like to use it to describe the battle over word count, common in newsrooms. It exists between editors and contributors. It exists between editors and reporters, who are also often required to write to a specified word count. The battle is essentially about whether readers want to read short or long articles.
Most newspapers prefer short opinion articles of not more than 700 words. Nation contributors and would-be contributors often complain that editors are too strict with their word count. I’ve dealt with this issue in the past but I cannot repeat it too often.
Often, the complaints are coupled with the accusation that, in shortening articles, editors distort the meaning intended in the original article. One complainant recently said, cleverly, that editors need some basic awareness on a topic to know when they are messing up facts — for example “changing internode to node” for brevity.
“I have personal experience with my article that had objective facts edited to distortion all in the name of making the article ‘appealing’ to readers,” said the writer.
However, distorting meaning or introducing errors while shortening articles is another problem, which should be dealt with separately. So let’s stay with the problem of the word count. Bitange Ndemo, a Nation columnist and associate professor at the University of Nairobi’s School of Business, holds the view that newspapers insist on short articles “at the expense of comprehensively dealing with the subject matter” (“How long should a newspaper article be?” — Nation Online, October 15, 2018).
He writes: “My own experience in writing has taught me that preference on any article has nothing to do with word count. Although I have written more 700-word pieces than longer pieces, it is the lengthy ones that have become memorable articles if we go by how widely they were shared on social media.
“Content rather than arbitrary word counts matters most in the likability of any article irrespective of where it is published.”
Not unique to journalism
Word count is not unique to journalism. It applies to other forms of writing — including school essays, journal articles, lawyer’s briefs and speeches. In schools, students are told to submit essays of so many pages, a form of word count. Journals specify the number of words that can be published. For example, The Lancet, the best-known weekly general medical journal, limits general articles to 3,500 words and comments 700 words.
Lawyers’ briefs are required to be just that — brief and crisp, saying only what need to be said to persuade a court one way or the other. During the case management conference for the BBI appeal held on June 2, Justice Daniel Masinga ruled that the appellate briefs shall be limited to “40 pages, font 12, 1 & 1/2 spacing”, which is a rough word count.
Left to themselves, lawyers could bring to court “a Canterful of documents” — to use a phrase coined by Mutuma Mathiu.
Winston Churchill is often accredited with the saying “A good speech [or any writing] should be like a woman’s skirt; long enough to cover the subject and short enough to create interest.” Verbiage and verbosity do not add value.
“Words, words, words,” replied the fictional character named Hamlet when Polonius asked, “What do you read, my lord?” in Shakespeare’s most popular play, Hamlet. By repeating the word three times, Hamlet suggests what he is reading is meaningless. In other words, you can say more — and sound more persuasive and intelligent — by using the minimum number of words.
One of Shakespeare’s best advice is: “Brevity is the soul of wit.” Getting the number of words just right is essential in journalism and other professions that depend on writing. BY DAILY NATION