The Long & Short Of It – What Type Of Writer Are You?

Catherine L. Tullyby Catherine L. Tully

I can’t write things that are long right out of the box. Whenever I write, it comes out brief and to the point. I tend to be concise and omit what I see as needless words and phrases.

Other writers (like Joe), have no difficulty whatsoever turning out lengthy prose. For them it is as difficult to edit down as it is for me to add detail.

Neither style is better than the other, but they both have distinct advantages and disadvantages when it comes to a writing career. So now let me ask…

Which type of writer are you?

Most of us fall heavily on one side or the other, and this can actually help you when it comes to getting work and being happy in your career as a writer. For example–my style of writing is well-suited to the web, since long paragraphs and in-depth pieces are less reader-friendly online. Writers that produce a lot of material would probably do very well trying to pitch magazines that do features as many of them are several pages long.

Matching your writing style up with the type of work you are going after can be an excellent idea. If you are working in an area that is well-suited to your natural ability, it will seem much easier. Sure, I can stretch my original copy and add to it–but it takes additional time. Writers that produce a lot of material can certainly edit themselves down, but if they don’t have to–all the better.

And with that, I’m going to end this piece with a couple of questions, rather than trying to make it longer than it needs to be….

What type of writer are you? Are you paired well with the work you do?

4 thoughts on “The Long & Short Of It – What Type Of Writer Are You?”

  1. I’m with you, Catherine. My sweet spot is somewhere between 10 words and 500 for corporate stuff, but go as long as 1500 for feature articles. Of course, I need to stretch that for the ebook I’m writing, but I’m still pursuing that in 500-word chunks!

  2. It’s an interesting question to consider, that’s for sure.

    When I know what I’m’ writing about I can crank out 1,000 words fairly easily. When I have to research something and then put it into my own words that slows down, yet I still find that I can get to 400 or 500 words okay. I couldn’t say that I’m brief and to the point when I write; actually, I figure that’s not really the point of writing, unless we’re talking Twitter. lol

  3. Back in my high school and college days, when a teacher would assign an essay with a word-count range, it was all I could do to hit the lower end. I loved it when they’d give a page count…because then I had the ability to widen the margins and fudge the line spacing to stretch things out, haha!

Comments are closed.