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WRITTEN COMMUNICATION:
PRINCIPLES AND PROBLEMS

Language is an effective aid to human communication. In the evolution of language, the spoken word had obviously come before the written. Earlier still, must have been the language of gesture, of dance and song. Spoken or written, language has come to be a sophisticated tool of communication, at various levels of sensibility in a civilised society.

In a socio-cultural milieu, with political overtones that dominate the others, it is worth remembering that language, is primarily a product of environment, a result of gradual absorption, no not so much of heredity. With so much loud talk about ‘mother-tongue� and ‘father-tongue�, linked to ‘ethnic identity� ‘regional autonomy� and so on, students of the ‘scientific method� (not restricted to the physical. or the biological sciences) should take care not to forget the basic fact that there is no language in our blood which is corpuscles and plasma.

Frederick the great of Prussia (now part of Germany) (1718-1786), a close friend of Voltaire; wrote excellent prose in French, though his mother-tongue was German. He made some experiments in language with a newborn baby, which was brought up in a jungle with no exposure to human speech, and which, in due course, began to howl to like a jackal and growl like a tiger cub.

It is time we learnt the lesson, even after the lapse of a couple of centuries - Which is that an language or languages can be acquired by anybody by adequate exposure and careful training. Several languages in fact by normal human beings of average intelligence, if only you care to catch them young, as is done in the U.K., French, Germany and other countries in Europe.

Now, what is worth learning is worth learning well. What, then is the purpose of language, of any language? “The final cause of speech is to get an idea as exactly as possible out of one mind into another. Its formal cause is such choice and disposition of words as will achieve this end most economically.� says well known British author G.M. Young.

It is just as well to remind ourselves that language conceals as well as reveals, mystifies as well as simplifies, confuses as well as clarifies. Obfuscation has become a fine art in certain areas modem communication.

Vivid and amusing examples of the last phenomenon could be found in that delightful serial, ‘Yes, Minister� put out (produced by BBC and telecast by Doordarshan some years ago). In that series, Sir Humphery Appleby the hard-boiled, Oxford-educated permanent Secretary leaves the Minister and the viewers guessing whether he is guiding or misguiding the wide-eyed, wonderstruck Minister or leading him by the nose.

When this character (Nigel Hawthorne in real life) happened to visit the Indian capital, he was mobbed by the top brass of the brown bureaucracy and pressed for a message to the army of civil (and not so civil) servants. His reply (obviously tongue-in cheek) was:

            Please, for Heaven�s sake, don�t say in a dozen simple words, when you could very well say it in a hundred and twenty complicated words and get away with it.�

They might not have needed that kind of advice. For our experts in the Secretariat have been doing nothing else for about 150 years Sir Humphrey taught more by example than by precept; or perhaps we equally well by both. He has many quotable quotes in the play. Butthis one, chosen by way of random sampling, is not by him, but by Major Saunders (in the installment. “The Whisky Priest�), approaching the Minister (Jim Hacker) with a request to investigate how British weapons, channelled through NATO, were being used by Italian Red Terrorists. These are his actual words:

�You see, now you know personally, even if you don�t know officially, you can use your personal knowledge to start official enquiries to get official confirmation of personal suspicion so that what you know personally but not officially you will then know officially as well as personally.�

On which the Minister adds in his diary:

�After a year in government I can now make sense of, and recall such sentences. Perhaps, in another year, I�ll be speaking like that myself�.

�You�re not related to Sir Humphery Appleby, are you? I enquired semi­-humorously. But no, This is not a family trait talent, this is the language of the governing classes as they try as always to have everything both ways.�

Another general saying of relevance here:

            So long as there is anything to be gained by saying nothing, it is always better to say nothing than any thing.

From the games played by trained personnel, with a vested interest in keeping things away from the layman by leaving him confused, let us turn to a comparative study of, or atleast a glance at the spoken word and written communication. We often hear that the spoken word is simple, spontaneous, vivid and vibrant, ardent and immediate in its impact. Hence the power of oratory, the urge to action, the magic spell of charismatic leaders, with their flair for the winged word. At the same time, it has to be admitted that there is something impulsive, hurried, often hasty, always ephemeral, about it. If it turns out to be imprecise, there is no room for correction by second thoughts.

The written word is apt to be dismissed as secondary, derivative, artificial, contrived, lacking in warmth, lesser in its impacts on the target, i.e. the recipient. But Jacques Derrida, the modern French philosopher and linguist (b. 1930), has other points for us to take note of. The written word is more precise, full of thought, better structured, more satisfying in style and substance, better designed for closer scrutiny and longer reference. With a tighter rein or the play of surface emotion it is likely to have greater intellectual authority and wider appeal.

Sir Earnest Gowers says in “the Complete Plain words�.

�Writing is an instrument for conveying ideas from one mind to another, the writer�s job is to make his reader apprehend his meaning readily and precisely. Do these letters always say just what the writer means? Nay, does he writer himself always know just what he means? Even when he knows what he means, and says it in a way that is clear to him, is it always equally clear to his reader? If not, he has not been getting on with the job�.

�The difficulty�, says Robert Stevenson (popularly known as RLS author of Virginibus Puerisque, Travels with a Donkey, and many novels, Treasure Island, kidnapped, Dr. Jekyll and Ms. Hyde etc. �is not to write, but to write what you mean; not to affect your reader, but to affect him precisely as you wish�.

Can we expect the average leader, unfamiliar with trade and commerce jargon, to grasp at once the meaning of this short and apparently simple sentence, for instance?:-­

�Prices are basis prices per ton for the representative basis-pricing specification and size and quantity.�

Most of us can’t unlock the secret of this without the help of a key. Yet the writer may be presumed to have known exactly, what he meant, the obscurity was not in his thought but in his way of expressing himself. It results in waste of time and energy of the reader and the writer.

The problem of obscurity and incomprehensibility, which could be present in any language, is compounded for us in his country, or magnified many fold, by the avoidable compulsion to translate everything into the regional languages, of which there must be two-dozen or more by now.

It always beats me how a Kisan in the field and a Mazdoor in the factory is so vitally interested in the mode of language used for notings on the files is the Secretariat or how internal administration is conducted or transactions are communicated in the Reserve Bank or the State Bank of India. His interests are anyway effectively; protected by his representative in the government-the Legislature and the Executive, whose pristine purity, intellectual equipment and integrity of character art unlikely to be affected by a modicum of literacy and a reasonable acquaintance with a language in which our constitution is drafted by the founding fathers and our administrative practices and procedures, as well as traditions and conventions which are available in their original form.

Not long ago, I had the intriguing experience, also amusing, of reading an official communication in a regional language, Telugu, received by a friend of mine in Madras, the author of a learned book of cultural interest in English from the Director of Public Libraries of a neighbouring State (AP in this case), in reply to his appeal to purchase some copies of the book for the like of me, I couldn’t make head or tail of what the high-placed official, or his not so high-placed deputy, was driving at, though Telugu happens to be my mother-tongue, and I am far from being illiterate in it. It was a routine letter in a stereotyped form (proforma as it is called), which could have been simple enough in the original (English); but in its indigenised form, it was unrivalled in clumsiness of expression and ambiguity of meaning.

Assuming that we are going to use the English language at a certain level, for certain purposes, let us turn our attention to some of the basic precautions to be taken in its use and some of the general guidelines to be followed in the interest of the best results to be obtained.

“Proper words in proper places makes the true definition of style�, according to Jonathan Swift, himself a satirist and stylist, looked upon as a model by many of his successors, including G.B. Shaw, a prose writer of brilliance, powder and wit. �The best words in their best order�, said Matthew Arnold on style in literalise.

            If language is not correct, then what is said is not what is meant, observed Confucius, the ancient authority from the East (China), if what is said is not what is meant, then what ought to be done remains undone.

The sage of China seems to have anticipated some of the leading modern thinkers on the science of language and that of psychology who believe that looseness of expression leads to or is linked with laxity of behaviour; Impreciseness and corruption of language resulting in incorrectness of behaviour and corruption of character orvice versa in a formula in which intellectual integrity can not be separated from accuracy of articulation.

Hence the extraordinary position given to the grammar of language in the European as well as Indian traditions of linguistic scholarship. Panini’s Ashtadhyayi and Patanjali’s Yogasutra are placed on a high pedestal as works of high spiritual value no less than of profound and original scholarship.

A couple of centuries. ago, William Cobbett (Prose writer and liberal thinker) said that grammar perfectly understood enables us not only to express our meaning fully and clearly; but so to express it as to defy the ingenuity of man to give our words any other meaning than that which we intended to express. It may be recalled how schools of Sanskrit grammar flourished in Kashi and Kanchi, Navadeep and elsewhere.

English grammar had, of late fallen on evil days, resulting in clumsy syntax, defective construction; vague meaning and uncertain connation. Even if normative grammar has gone out of vogue, formative grammar should not be overlooked by a writer.

As a professional writer and practising journalist I have always felt that any good writing must have qualities of clarity, economy and elegance in that order. This has the powerful support of the authors of King’s English (H. W. Fowler and G. Fowler) who advise any good writer to endeavour to be direct, simple, brief, vigorous and lucid.

This is more easily said than done. For the guidance of the writer aspiring to attain a high quality, the seasoned authors had translated the general principles mentioned into practical rules, or guidelines, if you like, on the choice of vocabulary, which areas follows: -
Prefer the familiar word to the farfetched; prefer the concrete word, to the abstract prefer the single word to the circumlocution, prefer the short word to the long. ‘Profer the Saxonword to the Romance�, which is the fifth and last rule framed by them might be or greater relevance to the native writers of English with a ground, of Greek and Latin at school and college (which is no longer the case); and to others who had specialised in English language and literature. For most of the others here now a days “Romance� is to be associated with the screen or the stage or more likely the T. V. and Video these days

Now, for one or two examples to illustrate each of the point:­-

1) The familiar word and the farfetched:
a)      “Continuance of vigilance is imperative on the public to ensure.....â€� (We must ever be on the watch/alert).
b)      “These maneuvers are by no means new, and their recrudescence is hardly calculated to influence the development of eventsâ€�. (The present use of them is not likely to be effective).

2) The concrete word (or expression) and to abstract�
a)      “There seems to have been an absence of attempt at conciliation between rival sectsâ€�. (The sects seem never even to have tried mutual conciliation)
b)      “The first private conference relating to the question of the convocation of representatives of the nation took place yesterdayâ€� (conference of national representation)

3) The single word and the circumlocution.
a)      “Mr. John Smith has been made the recipient of a silver medalâ€�. (received).
b)      “Mr. ABC is taking active measures for the prompt preparation of material for the study of the question of the execution of the Imperial ukase dealing with reformsâ€�. (collecting all information that may be needed before the reform can be implemented).

4) The Short and the Long:
a)      “On the Berlin Bourse today the prospect of a general strike was cheerfully envisagedâ€�. (Strike threat welcomed)
b)      “One of the most important reforms mentioned in the organisation of the judicial institutions and the guarantee for      all the tribunals of the Independence necessary for securing to all classes of the community equality before the lawâ€�. (is that of the courts, which need a uniform system, and the Independence without which it is impossible for all men to be equal before the law).

5) Saxon word and the Romance:
“Despite the unfavourable climatic conditions� (Though the weather was bad). There is also the classic example of the epitaph on the tombstone of William Pitt the younger (PM of England at 24/ which read; “He died poor� - Some of his ardent admirers, with enthusiasm out running intelligence (knowledge) wanted to improve upon it with a more dignified vocabulary. “He expired in indigent circumstances�. In the event, they didn’t or couldn’t do it. We are spared another violation of the guidelines suggested for good English.