Teachers would repeatedly remind us to be specific. “Avoid abstractions, opt for figures, not figure of speech,” a wizened professor who was youthful enough to have, “When I grow up, I want to be a Rolls Royce” sticker on his battered Premier car would say with a wink. His instructions used to be explicit: “Draw whatever you can. Number every feature.
Describe characteristics in as few words as possible. Details in sketches increase understanding. Digits clarify. Words confuse. Learn to communicate facts and keep feelings to yourself.” He was an exceptional educator. Many of us learnt from him what he intended to teach, rather than what he actually taught.
Facts are indeed useful in convincing adherents and canvassing support. However, stark figures can also become conversation stoppers. When the purpose of data is merely to inform, absolute clarity is necessary. Creative exchange, however, should inspire the receiver to interpret, extrapolate, infer, and get more value from the communication than was originally relayed. Information is conceived rather than conveyed.
Higher on the slope of data, information, knowledge and the wisdom hill, importance of a receiver becomes even more important. Wisdom, defined as “knowing the right things to do” and “the ability to make sound judgments and decisions apparently without thought”, cannot be imparted. The mind of the listener, reader or audience: the knower determines the purpose of communication: knowledge rather than its originator.
There is more—or less—to a piece of writing than what its author has expressed. Readers may get a completely different meaning from what the writer had set out to say.
Sometimes a creator too reads her own work differently than what she had originally composed. Designer Edwin Sclossberg proposes the purpose of writing: “The skill of writing is to create a context in which other people can think.” Lucidity clarifies but also inhibits contemplation whereas ambiguity inspires introspection. And there in lies the problem with circumspection. Most people are frightened of thinking.
The world is full of complexities. Clarity is necessary to comprehend life and survive. Running from one exigency to another, we want to ‘know’ our surroundings by making as little effort as necessary. The lure of instant intellectual gratification is irresistible. We sometimes form an opinion on the basis of headlines and highlights without bothering to read the text or check the fine prints. Propagandists feed on this emotional hunger. They package truths in bullet point presentations. News reports have word limits. Bite—not the sting of an insect but a shortened form of sound bite—is a popular term among ‘view porters’ of audiovisual media. Attention span is getting shorter. Few have the time to get into context.
Verbosity has its demerits as does overeating, but then fast facts are no healthier than fast food. However, the idea that anything that cannot be twitted (meaning of the original verb: reproach or taunt) in 140 words is not worth communicating, has found wider acceptance. Forget long-form essays, even 1000-word opinion pieces are often frowned upon.
On a personal level, many readers often reprimand me that I use too many words to say what I want to say but ultimately leave what I wanted to say unsaid. It is hard to explain that saying nothing while recording the process of mental exploration is not as easy as it sounds at first instance.
Those who have things to say use expressions to create an impression. However, the endeavour to discover the world that words would lead to is a journey without a clear destination. Once on the road, established facts begin to fall by the wayside. Perceived realities keep changing like scenery along a mountain trail. Truth appears tantalising close but moves ahead the moment you extend your hand to grab it.
News reports have a set format—they must address the hallowed five W’s and H (What, when, where, who, why and how?) queries of information gathering. However, even these simple questions cannot be answered with a straight yes or no. The moment there is a need for some explanation, speculation seeps into the report like mist on a foggy morning when one opens the door. No matter how factual a piece of work, it would still read like fiction to some. Objectivity and fairness are worthwhile goals, but a reporter or a view porter is not merely a recording instrument. He or she too is subjected to pressures of events and moods like any other person.
It is extremely difficult to explain something that was written last week, let alone last year or in the previous decades. These worries torment me as I prepare for my first visit to the United States of America. I learnt English through phrasebooks similar to “English as she is spoke” back in my village and our professors at the engineering school were not too particular about the language either. The prospect of interacting with people, who use English as their first language still intimidates me. Even years of reading and writing do not equip a person with the ability to capture the intent of commonplace phrases and comprehend nuances that are more meaningful than expressions used in everyday conversations.
Ashok Gurung, Senior Director of India-China Institute at the New School University wants me to talk to some of his students about my writing. The topic first suggested was intimidating—I was asked whether it would be possible to discuss my evolution as a writer. The theme was slightly ambitious too. While it is true that I am writing more than ever before, but I have yet to evolve fully to talk about it.
There was another problem. In Nepal, even if someone has published a guidebook for clerical examinations of Public Service Commission, he immediately earns the right to call himself a writer. Over quarter of a century, I may have churned out millions of words for various publications, but I am still considered an outsider in the company of writers and critics. Litterateurs in Kathmandu, introduce me to their peers with a dismissive remark, “Even though he is an engineer, he also writes for newspapers.” Ultimately it was agreed that we would discuss some of my writings over last ten years. It has been a defining decade for Nepal’s history and I had the privilege of chronicling events from close quarters and with the consistency of at least three pieces published almost every week.
My engineering teacher would have rebuked me had he heard the sentence, “The statement is vague at best. What is the meaning of a defining decade? What was the basis of your privilege? What kinds of events have you chronicled? How distant is close enough, and a quarter of which figure? You have not mentioned boundaries of consistency. The qualifier ‘at least’ is indicative, but what were the upper limits and the average of productivity? The phrase ‘almost’ is mostly meaningless. Every week? Are you sure there were no exceptions? Dates have to be exact.” And so on and so forth. However, I am sure he would have approved had he known that I was talking about generalities rather than asking or answering a specific enquiry or preparing a set of comprehensible instructions.
Simplification is possible when direct questions are being answered. However, when concerns have to be raised, issues debated, apprehensions gauged and implications of a decision or an event considered, it becomes necessary to feel one’s way into the fogginess of statistics falling all around. The one who knew that the only thing he knew was that he knew nothing knew something. Most of us spend our lives searching things to know even as we learn ways to survive.
I am sure readers of this piece, and even its editors, are going to chuckle—uncharacteristically too many ‘I’, ‘me’ and ‘my’ in the column this time. Yes, I have to admit that I have been infected with the American disease without setting foot in the citadel of modernity and individuality. There is little ambiguity in that sentence, ‘facts’ speak for themselves: I have used more ‘I’, ‘me’ and ‘my’ in this piece than I might have done over many years. On that pompous note, let me (once again!) wish you all A Happy New Year. With statements of good wishes from President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, the Nepali New Year has been sanctified as one of the official celebrations of the global civilisation over which USA presides.
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