Author: Kate Epstein, editor, EpsteinWords
It happens all the time: you write an article that is the right length for a particular outlet, and then you learn you’re going to have to shorten it for some other journal or book. It’s exhausting, I think, to imagine how to take a paper you were happy with and chuck a thousand or more words without ruining it. But I do it for scholars all the time, and I’ve learned some principles you can use.
First, cutting words is quite different from cutting pages. Cutting pages is ultimately cutting the number of lines in a piece, and cutting words can actually create more lines. Cutting words means using longer words, which forces more frequent line breaks. I’m going to focus on cutting words here. When I cut pages I do a lot more trial and error than when I cut words.
Second, if you want to keep all the bones and muscle and just drop fat, that involves cutting one word at a time. I frequently find I can trim an article by about 10% just by pulling every word each sentence can spare. Here are some examples from a recent speech by Kamala Harris:
“It is truly an honor to be speaking with you.” “I am honored to speak with you.” Three words fewer.
“But as Americans, we all stand on their shoulders.” Cut “all” to save one word.
“On that day, she probably could have never imagined that I would be standing before you now speaking these words…” “On that day, she probably didn’t imagine that I would stand before you now and say…” Four words trimmed.
Some things to look for when you’re trimming word by word:
- Words like “is” and “are” can often come out, often by making passive verbs active.
- Wordier verb forms like “be standing” can be simplified to past tense, “stood.”
- Strike articles like “the” or “a” by using a plural form.
- When “and” links two independent clauses, delete the “and” in favor of separate sentences.
- The abbreviation i.e., which means that is, is often superfluous altogether.
- If you must, make “for example” into e.g. (though the style guides recommend only using such abbreviations in parentheses).
- Verbs that need a preposition can become one word: make “living through” into “surviving.”
- If information appears in both the text and a table or figure, either cut the graphic or cut the information from the text.
Another way of keeping all the meaning while trimming some words is to combine sentences that might pertain to the same thing. Pronouns often signal such opportunities. For example, James Suroweicki wrote in Medium: “Bitcoin was, after all, not designed to be a speculative asset. It was designed to be a currency, a new medium of exchange that people could, and would, use to transact daily business with each other.” No meaning disappears with “Bitcoin was, after all, not designed to be a speculative asset, but a currency, a new medium of exchange that people could, and would, use to transact daily business with each other.” That’s five fewer words even without doing anything else. Of course, doing this too much can mean that long sentences dominate your paper, exhausting your reader. But doing it judiciously—especially if you can find other trims to the resulting sentences—can help you reach your word count goal.
Another place to look for words to cut is in direct quotes. It’s pretty common that you can paraphrase them, or only use choice bits, in fewer words. “Harris said she was honored to speak to the DNC” is one word shorter than “Harris said, ‘I am honored to speak with you,’” and four words shorter than (using the actual quote) “Harris said, ‘It is truly an honor to be speaking with you.’”
A third way to trim is to tighten your paper’s organization. If you’re repeating yourself, or writing “as mentioned above,” see if you can reorder your arguments so you don’t need the repetition. If you’re having trouble seeing this, creating an outline may give you the bird’s eye view. People who find it painful to create an outline before they write the paper may not find it painful to create one of a paper they’ve already written.
Fourth, if you’ve still got more words than is allowable, maybe you need to cut some of your weaker arguments or points—now that the fat is gone, you need to surrender a little muscle. It really depends on how you write, but if your target is less than about 85% of the original, you likely need to go beyond the fat.
Finally, the fifth principle is not exactly a principle: a professional editor can make this easier on you, for a fee. I trim writing a lot. Even when not specifically directed to, I typically make scholarly writing more succinct because I think concision is better, and may allow my clients to include arguments that they thought they couldn’t fit. (Concision is usually better. In a speech, a little looseness may add to the drama.) Practice has made me speedy at trimming, and of course I don’t have your emotional attachment to the words on the page already. I’d love to hear from you.
Kate Epstein has been editing scholarly work since 2012. She offers the first four hours of substantive editing at a discount to NCFDD members.
Her website is at www.epsteinwords.com.