'Omit Unnecessary Words' Is Terrible Terrible Terrible Terrible Advice (6/30)
I'm writing 30 essays in 30 days. This is number 6.
But it's in the spirit of some pretty good advice from Kurt Vonnegut: "pity the reader." In other words, remember that your reader is likely a busy, tired, lonely, confused person, trying not to recall what became of their ambitions. So, try to be entertaining, or at least engaging.
However, what the fuck is an unnecessary word? How is any of this "necessary?" Unless you're writing directions for an oxygen mask, what you're doing isn't strictly necessary, and, even then, the cartoon is probably going to do a better job than you are.
Do you mean, "necessary to convey the information I'm conveying?" Is that what you think you're doing when you write? Delivering information? That's a part of it, just like plot is an important part of opera. But, if you're writing something longer than an "okay thanks" email, your information probably won't do much unless your reader is either emotionally engaged or doing pure research. Even in the latter case, they'd probably prefer to be having a good time.
And, generally, having a good time means being in good company—encountering a narrative voice you connect to. Maybe that's not this, maybe you think I sound like a ten-dollar asshole. That's fine.
What's not fine is forbidding yourself tangents, asides, goofy similes, and other luxuries because you feel like you have a job to do, the job of Getting The Point Across. Ironically, it's this businesslike attitude that will stop your writing from being compelling, because it'll keep you in one emotional register. You know the one. You see it a lot on LinkedIn. It's not memorable. It's not fun. Not, anyway, as a steady diet.
Sure, spare writing often works. It's lean. Muscular. Precise. But sometimes the chatty voice that just says whatever about stuff will put you at ease. And sometimes you'll be gratified by the intensity of magisterial diction that speaks of conquest and consanguinity instead of just winning and liking. Occasionally, an unexpected swerve in vocabulary keeps the brain happy. Sometimes it's useful to talk extravagantly about the evening's settling scarlet to set the stage for some pain.
Failing all of that: a lot of people write well when they write like they talk. It feels sincere. And you probably don't talk like sleek sales copy. If you do, may I interest you in some hallucinogens?
Don't get me wrong. Concision is a decent guideline when you're revising. Brevity is often desirable. But it's a terrible ideal to cling to when you're writing a first draft. If you insist on brevity at all times, you'll limit yourself. You'll miss out on the high-variance verbal accidents—the spontaneous flights of fancy that, 90% of the time, will be unbearable, but that, occasionally, will give your work the specific grit that nobody else could achieve.
All of this is to say that "omit unnecessary words" is fine, if, by that, you mean "remove what doesn't serve your artistic goals, after you release the verbal landslide you're keeping inside." Otherwise, I don't care for it. Give me your unnecessary words. I don't need them, but I do want them.