Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Creating A Verbal Symphony


MARCH 28, 2011; SAN ANTONIO, TX: Writing in an intriguing way that keeps the reader involved and interested is a skill. Unfortunately, far too many people writing on the web lack this skill. They produce the equivalent of verbal polyester: it is serviceable but not pretty or memorable. This blog is about how to write engaging and informative prose.
One thing that is often forgotten is that writing is about words. The more that you know and use, the better that your writing can be. Variety isn't just the spice of life. Variety is verbal flavoring. Varying word choice keeps readers intrigued. Word choice also adds to the melody of what you write when it is read. Think of words as the notes in a song.. Just as music entertains the ear with its varied notes, melody and repeated phrases, so can the right mixture of words create a feast for the mind and the ears. For those wanting to acquire verbal agility, here are some great tools.

The Visual Thesaurus http://www.visualthesaurus.com/
Not only can you look words up by their meaning, but by their proximity to other words. Even though their definitions can be a shade off, it is a remarkable tool. There are two versions: an online subscription and a desktop variant.

Word Menu  
There are two versions of this tool. One is a book that I like very much and the other is software that I have not used. The software comes from the same author as the book. If it has the same functionality as the book, then it would be very useful. Word Menu, the book,  organizes words by categories like industry.  This permits a user to become familiar with the vocabulary for a particular industry, science, or profession in one sitting. This is a wonderful tool for freelance writers. Not only can one be up to speed rapidly on specialized jargon, but Word Menu but relevant key issues for that industry as well.

Dictionaries
There are many varieties of dictionaries out there. The best way to choose is to find one that has as many words as possible and detailed word origins. Knowing the derivation of a word not only builds a foundation for learning foreign languages, but it helps with being able to infer meanings of unknown words as they arise in research.

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