The journalism professor was not having much "fun" explaining things to her feature-writing students: "I know so fun is wrong but I can't tell them why," she wrote. "So happy is right, but so fun should have 'much' as the sandwich filling."  Continue reading...

Writing coach Daphne Gray-Grant has an unusual suggestion for writers developing their craft: "Take a published work, written by an author you respect and admire, and copy a portion of it, word for word." Just don't pass it off as your own!  Continue reading...

Michael Lydon makes an eloquent case for the central role of assonance in the craft of fine writing: "More than a device we can apply by rule or rote, assonance comes to us as a gift from language itself, from our deep animal urge to communicate with our voices."  Continue reading...

Machines can grade essays as accurately as human readers. According to the New York Times, a competition sponsored by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation produced software able to match human essay readers grade for grade, and a study of commercially-available automatic grading programs showed that computers assessed essays as accurately as human readers, but a whole lot faster, and cheaper, to boot. But that's just the start: computers could lead to a reading-free future.  Continue reading...

What keeps writing alive? The truth of life. Getting the truth into words is our only hope for immortality. Writing that speaks falsely about life dwindles down to death in a matter of decades.  Continue reading...

How are you at handling criticism? I don't mean comments about your driving or your housework or your management style. And I particularly don't mean criticism from your kids. (Anyone who can tolerate that with grace deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for parenting.) I'm talking about criticism of your writing.  Continue reading...