... education, or interest in it.
Science writers and editors needn’t start off knowing
much science. Some of the best of them do, but some of the
best of them don’t. They must, though, be able to ... today about writing, espe-
cially writing about science, medicine, and other difficult
subjects, I learned then. Others did, too. Those who came to
see the ceaseless flow of red...
... into words: mastering the craft of science writing / Elise Hancock.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-8018-7 329 -0 — ISBN 0-8018-7330-4
1. Technical writing. I. Title.
T11 .H255 20 03
808′.0665—dc21 20 020 11065
A catalog ... ix
Acknowledgments xvii
1. A Matter of Attitude 1
2. Finding Stories 29
3. Finding Out: Research and the Interview 45
4. Writing: Getting Started and the Structure...
... the ma-
A Matter of Attitude
Only connect.
—E. M. Forster,
Howards End
terial as they do with the readers. Indeed, their curiosity and
its fruits are a large part of what the reader senses, of ... always have the reader in mind, not only as they write
but also in the finding out that comes before. They do
their research with integrity, digging deep, and they write
with the...
... habits: (1) the habit of
Ideas
into
Words
26
writing itself, so that it feels natural, and (2) the habit of im-
printing the details of what you see and hear on your mind
long enough to write them down. ... of Being that in
turn gives rise to appropriate Doing.
You can spot the best mentors, like the best parents and
the best shrinks, because their former protégés are o...
... on.
Another whole class of story ideas arrives from the other
direction: from outside the world of research, in the form
of a question, observation, or piece of news.To under-
stand the phenomenon then ... scientists,
Finding
Stories
33
as for the rest of us, ideas spark each other off, showing their
full size only as they connect. Sometimes it’s hard to know
what you thin...
... needs. For example: the
Insured, the Uninsured, the Doctor, the Insurance Company,
the Taxpayer, the Hospital, the Residents and Medical Stu-
dents, the Medical Teachers, the Makers of Medical Parapher-
nalia ... Each party brings special expertise
to the table .The science writer knows how to translate
science for the public, while the scientist knows the sci...
... Guaranteed, there must have
been other ways to approach the issue, so what was the advan-
tage of this one? The answers are always part of a larger pic-
ture, about either the science or the research ... after 24 hours is . ” Or,
“We assembled a control group of 23 0 people. The group
had to be that big because X. It was important that they all Y
because Z.” The root...
... inter-
views, the machine took enough attention that my rapport
with the other person suffered, plus I often lost track of the
content. The problem is that, when I’m typing at the speed
of speech, the ... questions and find out the
answers; you ponder some more.
A period of wandering in a formless void is necessary to
any writing of substance, simply as part of achi...
... people write the body of the text first and save the
opener to write last, to benefit from all the clarity that the
writing brought. If that works for you, great.
Others find (and I am one of them) that ... paintbrush.
Yes, but the next morning you do the whole job in three
hours, and there’s no need to razor the windows or scrub
paint off the floor. And it’s the same wa...
... is often most clear at
its inception. For example, here is Malcolm Gladwell (au-
thor of The Tipping Point) describing the invention of television
in the New Yorker (May 27 , 20 02, p. 1 12) :
The ... magnifi-
cent island.”
Then I considered the essay’s title: The Island at the End
of the Earth.” Hmm. In many seagoing cultures, the islands
at the end of the world...