 May 2025 2025 年 5 月 There are two senses in which writing can be good: it can sound good, and the ideas can be right. It can have nice, flowing sentences, and it can draw correct conclusions about important things. It might seem as if these two kinds of good would be unrelated, like the speed of a car and the color it's painted. And yet I don't think they are. I think writing that sounds good is more likely to be right. 好的寫作可以從兩個層面來理解：一是聽起來悅耳，二是觀點正確。它可以擁有優美流暢的句子，也能對重要事物得出正確結論。這兩種「好」看似毫不相關，就像汽車的速度與烤漆顏色般互不相干。但我認為它們其實息息相關——聽起來悅耳的文字往往更可能正確無誤。 So here we have the most exciting kind of idea: one that seems both preposterous and true. Let's examine it. How can this possibly be true? 於是我們遇見了最令人振奮的那種觀點：看似荒謬卻真實無比。讓我們深入探討：這種說法怎麼可能是真的？ I know it's true from writing. You can't simultaneously optimize two unrelated things; when you push one far enough, you always end up sacrificing the other. And yet no matter how hard I push, I never find myself having to choose between the sentence that sounds best and the one that expresses an idea best. If I did, it would be frivolous to care how sentences sound. But in practice it feels the opposite of frivolous. Fixing sentences that sound bad seems to help get the ideas right. [1] 我從寫作經驗中確知這是真理。你無法同時優化兩件毫無關聯的事物；當你將其中一項推向極致時，總得犧牲另一項。然而無論我多麼努力嘗試，從未面臨要在「聽起來最優美」與「最能表達思想」的句子間做抉擇。若真需取捨，那麼在乎文句音韻就顯得輕浮了。但實際情況恰恰相反——修正那些聽起來彆扭的句子，似乎總能幫助釐清思想。[1] By right I mean more than just true. Getting the ideas right means developing them well — drawing the conclusions that matter most, and exploring each one to the right level of detail. So getting the ideas right is not just a matter of saying true things, but saying the right true things. 我所謂的「正確」不僅僅是指真實。讓想法正確意味著要好好發展它們——得出最重要的結論，並在適當的細節層次上探討每一個想法。因此，讓想法正確不僅僅是說出真實的事情，而是要說出正確的真實事情。 How could trying to make sentences sound good help you do that? The clue to the answer is something I noticed 30 years ago when I was doing the layout for my first book. Sometimes when you're laying out text you have bad luck. For example, you get a section that runs one line longer than the page. I don't know what ordinary typesetters do in this situation, but what I did was rewrite the section to make it a line shorter. You'd expect such an arbitrary constraint to make the writing worse. But I found, to my surprise, that it never did. I always ended up with something I liked better. 試著讓句子聽起來更好怎麼可能有助於做到這一點呢？答案的線索來自 30 年前我為第一本書排版時注意到的一件事。有時候在排版時會遇到運氣不好的情況。例如，某個章節比頁面多出一行。我不知道一般的排版人員在這種情況下會怎麼做，但我所做的就是重寫這個章節，讓它縮短一行。你可能會認為這種隨意的限制會讓文章變得更糟。但令我驚訝的是，我發現從來沒有這樣。我總是能寫出更喜歡的東西。 I don't think this was because my writing was especially careless. I think if you pointed to a random paragraph in anything written by anyone and told them to make it slightly shorter (or longer), they'd probably be able to come up with something better. 我不認為這是因為我的寫作特別粗心。我想，如果你隨便指向任何人寫的任何段落，並要求他們稍微縮短（或加長）它，他們很可能能夠想出更好的東西。 The best analogy for this phenomenon is when you shake a bin full of different objects. The shakes are arbitrary motions. Or more precisely, they're not calculated to make any two specific objects fit more closely together. And yet repeated shaking inevitably makes the objects discover brilliantly clever ways of packing themselves. Gravity won't let them become less tightly packed, so any change has to be a change for the better. [2] 這個現象最貼切的比喻，就是當你搖晃一個裝滿各種物品的垃圾桶。那些搖晃動作都是隨機的。更準確地說，這些動作並非為了讓任何兩個特定物品更緊密地貼合。然而反覆搖晃終究會讓物品們找到絕妙的排列方式。地心引力不允許它們變得鬆散，所以任何改變都必然是往更好的方向發展。[2] So it is with writing. If you have to rewrite an awkward passage, you'll never do it in a way that makes it less true. You couldn't bear it, any more than gravity could bear things floating upward. So any change in the ideas has to be a change for the better. 寫作也是如此。當你必須重寫一段彆扭的文字時，你絕不會把它改得偏離事實。你無法忍受這種情況，就像地心引力無法忍受物體往上飄浮一樣。所以任何對想法的修改，都必然是往更完善的方向調整。 It's obvious once you think about it. Writing that sounds good is more likely to be right for the same reason that a well-shaken bin is more likely to be tightly packed. But there's something else going on as well. Sounding good isn't just a random external force that leaves the ideas in an essay better off. It actually helps you to get them right. 仔細想想就會明白這個道理。聽起來流暢的文章更可能是正確的，這就像充分搖晃過的垃圾桶更可能緊密堆疊。但除此之外還有更深層的原因。文筆流暢不僅是隨機的外力讓文章觀點更完善，它實際上能幫助你更準確地表達想法。 The reason is that it makes the essay easier to read. It's less work to read writing that flows well. How does that help the writer? Because the writer is the first reader. When I'm working on an essay, I spend far more time reading than writing. I'll reread some parts 50 or 100 times, replaying the thoughts in them and asking myself, like someone sanding a piece of wood, does anything catch? Does anything feel wrong? And the easier the essay is to read, the easier it is to notice if something catches. 原因是這樣能讓文章更容易閱讀。流暢的文章讀起來更省力。這對作者有什麼幫助？因為作者就是第一位讀者。當我在寫一篇文章時，花在閱讀上的時間遠比寫作多得多。有些段落我會重讀 50 甚至 100 遍，反覆咀嚼其中的思緒，像打磨木頭般自問：有沒有哪裡卡住？有沒有哪裡感覺不對？文章越容易閱讀，就越容易發現這些卡頓之處。 So yes, the two senses of good writing are connected in at least two ways. Trying to make writing sound good makes you fix mistakes unconsciously, and also helps you fix them consciously; it shakes the bin of ideas, and also makes mistakes easier to see. But now that we've dissolved one layer of preposterousness, I can't resist adding another. Does sounding good do more than just help you get the ideas right? Is writing that sounds good inherently more likely to be right? Crazy as it may seem, I think that's true too. 所以沒錯，好文章的兩種意義至少以兩種方式相互關聯。試圖讓文章讀起來流暢，既能讓你無意識地修正錯誤，也能有意識地協助修正；它既能搖晃靈感的篩網，又能讓錯誤更顯而易見。但既然我們已經解開了一層荒謬，我忍不住要再揭開另一層：流暢的文筆難道僅止於幫助釐清思緒嗎？聽起來流暢的文章，是否本質上就更可能是正確的？儘管聽來瘋狂，我認為確實如此。 Obviously there's a connection at the level of individual words. There are lots of words in English that sound like what they mean, often in wonderfully subtle ways. Glitter. Round. Scrape. Prim. Cavalcade. But the sound of good writing depends even more on the way you put words together, and there's a connection at that level too. 顯然在單詞層面上存在著某種聯繫。英文中有許多詞彙的發音與其意義相呼應，這種呼應往往微妙得令人驚嘆。像是「閃爍」（Glitter）、「圓潤」（Round）、「刮擦」（Scrape）、「拘謹」（Prim）、「行列」（Cavalcade）。但優秀文筆的韻律感更取決於詞語的組合方式，而這種組合同樣存在著深層聯繫。 When writing sounds good, it's mostly because it has good rhythm. But the rhythm of good writing is not the rhythm of music, or the meter of verse. It's not so regular. If it were, it wouldn't be good, because the rhythm of good writing has to match the ideas in it, and ideas have all kinds of different shapes. Sometimes they're simple and you just state them. But other times they're more subtle, and you need longer, more complicated sentences to tease out all the implications. 當文字讀來悅耳時，多半是因為它具有優美的節奏。但優秀文筆的節奏不同於音樂的節律，也不同於詩歌的韻腳。它沒那麼規整。若真如此規整，反倒稱不上好文章，因為好文章的節奏必須與其中蘊含的思想相契合，而思想本就有著千姿百態。有時它們簡單直白，你只需平鋪直敘；但有時它們微妙難測，這時你就需要更長、更複雜的句子來梳理所有隱含的意義。 An essay is a cleaned up train of thought, in the same way dialogue is cleaned up conversation, and a train of thought has a natural rhythm. So when an essay sounds good, it's not merely because it has a pleasing rhythm, but because it has its natural one. Which means you can use getting the rhythm right as a heuristic for getting the ideas right. And not just in principle: good writers do both simultaneously as a matter of course. Often I don't even distinguish between the two problems. I just think Ugh, this doesn't sound right; what do I mean to say here? [3] 一篇散文就像經過梳理的思緒，正如對話是經過整理的談話一樣，而思緒本身有其自然的節奏。因此，當一篇散文聽起來悅耳時，不僅僅是因為它有令人愉悅的節奏，更是因為它擁有自然的節奏。這意味著你可以把調整節奏當作一種啟發式方法，來確保思想的準確性。而且不僅僅是理論上如此：優秀的作家在寫作時自然會同時兼顧這兩者。我甚至常常不區分這兩個問題。我只是覺得「呃，這聽起來不太對；我到底想表達什麼？」[3] The sound of writing turns out to be more like the shape of a plane than the color of a car. If it looks good, as Kelly Johnson used to say, it will fly well. 寫作的韻律最終更像是飛機的形狀，而非汽車的顏色。正如凱利·強生常說的那樣，如果它看起來不錯，那它飛起來也會很好。 This is only true of writing that's used to develop ideas, though. It doesn't apply when you have ideas in some other way and then write about them afterward — for example, if you build something, or conduct an experiment, and then write a paper about it. In such cases the ideas often live more in the work than the writing, so the writing can be bad even though the ideas are good. The writing in textbooks and popular surveys can be bad for the same reason: the author isn't developing the ideas, merely describing other people's. It's only when you're writing to develop ideas that there's such a close connection between the two senses of doing it well. 不過這僅適用於用來發展想法的寫作。當你透過其他方式獲得想法後再寫作時，就不適用這個原則——例如，當你建造了某樣東西或進行了實驗，然後撰寫相關論文時。在這種情況下，想法往往更多存在於實際工作中而非文字裡，因此即使想法很好，寫作也可能很糟糕。教科書和大眾科普書籍的寫作也可能出於同樣原因而表現不佳：作者並非在發展想法，而僅僅是在描述他人的觀點。只有當你為了發展想法而寫作時，這兩種「做好」之間才會存在如此緊密的聯繫。 Ok, many people will be thinking, this seems plausible so far, but what about liars? Is it not notoriously possible for a smooth-tongued liar to write something beautiful that's completely false? 好吧，許多人可能會想，到目前為止這聽起來似乎合理，但騙子又該怎麼解釋呢？難道不是眾所周知地，一個巧舌如簧的騙子也能寫出完全虛假卻優美的文章嗎？ It is, of course. But not without method acting. The way to write something beautiful and false is to begin by making yourself almost believe it. So just like someone writing something beautiful and true, you're presenting a perfectly-formed train of thought. The difference is the point where it attaches to the world. You're saying something that would be true if certain false premises were. If for some bizarre reason the number of jobs in a country were fixed, then immigrants really would be taking our jobs. 當然是這樣。但這並非沒有方法可循。要寫出美麗卻虛假的內容，首先要讓自己幾乎相信它。就像寫出美麗而真實的東西一樣，你呈現的是一條完美成形的思路。差別在於它與現實世界的連結點。你說的內容在某些虛假前提下會成立。如果出於某種荒謬原因，一個國家的就業機會數量是固定的，那麼移民確實會搶走我們的工作。 So it's not quite right to say that better sounding writing is more likely to be true. Better sounding writing is more likely to be internally consistent. If the writer is honest, internal consistency and truth converge. 所以說「聽起來更好的文章更可能是真的」並不完全正確。聽起來更好的文章更可能具有內在一致性。如果作者誠實，內在一致性與真實性就會趨於一致。 But while we can't safely conclude that beautiful writing is true, it's usually safe to conclude the converse: something that seems clumsily written will usually have gotten the ideas wrong too. 雖然我們不能安全地斷言優美的文章就是真實的，但通常可以安全地反過來推論：看起來寫得笨拙的東西，通常連概念也搞錯了。 Indeed, the two senses of good writing are more like two ends of the same thing. The connection between them is not a rigid one; the goodness of good writing is not a rod but a rope, with multiple overlapping connections running through it. But it's hard to move one end without moving the other. It's hard to be right without sounding right. 確實，好文章的兩種特質更像是同一件事物的兩端。它們之間的連結並非僵化不變；好文章的特質不是一根鐵棒，而是一條繩索，由多重交織的連結貫穿其中。但當你拉動其中一端時，另一端很難不跟著移動。要寫得正確卻不聽起來順暢，實在很難。 Notes 筆記 [1] The closest thing to an exception is when you have to go back and insert a new point into the middle of something you've written. This often messes up the flow, sometimes in ways you can never quite repair. But I think the ultimate source of this problem is that ideas are tree-shaped and essays are linear. You inevitably run into difficulties when you try to cram the former into the latter. Frankly it's surprising how much you can get away with. But even so you sometimes have to resort to an endnote. [1] 最接近例外的情況是，當你必須回頭在已寫好的文章中段插入新論點時。這往往會破壞行文流暢度，有時甚至造成無法完全修復的損傷。但我認為問題的根本原因在於：思想呈現樹狀結構，而文章卻是線性發展。當你試圖將前者塞進後者時，難免會遇到困難。說實話，能勉強應付的情況已經很令人驚訝了。即便如此，有時你還是得借助尾註來解決。 [2] Obviously if you shake the bin hard enough the objects in it can become less tightly packed. And similarly, if you imposed some huge external constraint on your writing, like using alternating one and two syllable words, the ideas would start to suffer. [2] 顯然地，如果你用力搖晃垃圾桶，裡面的物品確實可能變得沒那麼緊密。同理，若對寫作施加某些極端的外部限制（例如交替使用單音節與雙音節詞彙），文章的思想性就會開始受損。 [3] Bizarrely enough, this happened in the writing of this very paragraph. An earlier version shared several phrases in common with the preceding paragraph, and the repetition bugged me each time I reread it. When I got annoyed enough to fix it, I discovered that the repetition reflected a problem in the underlying ideas, and I fixed both simultaneously. [3] 詭異的是，這情況就發生在我撰寫本段時。初稿與前段有數個重複用語，每次重讀都讓我渾身不對勁。當我終於受不了動手修改時，竟發現這種重複其實反映了核心概念的缺陷，於是我同時修正了這兩項問題。 Thanks to Jessica Livingston and Courtenay Pipkin for reading drafts of this. 感謝潔西卡·利文斯頓和柯特妮·皮普金閱讀本文草稿。 |