Many complain that in writing, there are too many rules. But to me, speaking has always seemed heavier with rules, many of them hidden and unknowable; at least in writing, I knew what they were. I could look at any grammar book and find them.
The rules of speaking were always changing, according to circumstance. At sports events, you were supposed to cheer and be rowdy. In school, you sat quietly and asked for permission to get out of your seat. At funerals, you had to pick your words carefully. At home, you could say anything, but away, you had to be guarded and polite.
It was not that I wanted to say insensitive things at a formal event or be rowdy at school–but the ideathat a behavior code existed, and I was expected to follow it, made me uncomfortable.
Even as I cooperated, my mind had a way of rebelling, exploring the the limits of my prison. What if I screamed the words“Allahu Akbar?” What if I repeated everything I just said, as if I have forgotten I ever said it? What if I ate my mashed potatoes with my fingers?
After having these thoughts, I would tense, as if suddenly I would lose control and do all the things I was thinking. Is it possible, I wonder, to have closet Turrets?
To make matters worse, I would imagine hidden rules lying treacherously in wait, ready to unleash swift reprisal. What if I said something horribly offensive by accident? Unable to recover, publicly shunned, I would possibly be forced into the desert to live off berries and cactus juice.
Shyness often arises when you are not exactly sure how you are should behave in a new situation, so you lie low and say nothing. I have a word for this: protocol anxiety.
Because of protocol anxiety, at parties and other group events, I always try to smile and act polite, but I am often eager to escape – and euphoric when I finally do.
In writing, I found more room to move, a place to be more honest, whereas in speaking, there seemed to be too many rules for free expression. Writing was a place where all my unspoken thoughts could find a home.
I turned to writing when I wanted to say anything meaningful – or even funny. It was where I could relax and be playful – a different world.
Many view writing as stiff and formal, to be used grudgingly, for homework and special circumstances – an uncomfortable chore. Many adults tend to use dry, stiff language because they think it is expected; in business, they tend to over-utilize the word “utilize.”
Conversation feels more casual and friendly to most people. Writing, they say, disembodies; it reduces living people to lines of printed characters. It robs them of gestures, facial expressions, tone of voice, body language. The most charismatic, inspiring individuals can fade into lines of text – and disappear.
Some people feel so imprisoned by the formal rules of grammar that they rebel. Even the greatest writers sometimes break the rules deliberately for one reason or another, switching tenses, beginning sentences with “and” or “but.” James Joyce rebelled his way into literary history with his stream of consciousness style.
“Learn the rules first; then you can break them.”
This is common advice to beginning writers who want to rebel against grammar, thinking any rules inhibit free expression. The advice is good; for the most part, the rules of grammar exist to express ideas more clearly – but that is not always enough. There is a time to break the rules, but doing that well means knowing what they are – and why the exist.
People who feel uncomfortable with the rules of writing suffer from a protocol anxiety similar to my own. They see the expressive potential of writing, but the compulsion to “do it right” makes them feel the way I sometimes do when I am trapped at a dinner table with strangers talking about sports.
Since I know next to nothing about sports, there are few “right” things I can possibly say, but I still feel I am expected to say something. Instead, I often smile and nod and act interested, rather than attempt to say the “right” things, which seems to involve passionately loving one team and vilifying the other.
But lately I have noticed that for people who are masters of speaking, doing things right is the least of their worries. This group includes comedians and professional speakers, but also some of the kids I grew up with, who had a natural charm and gift for conversation.
They are like magicians who sweep onto the stage at a formal event, bow majestically, and drink the warmth of the spotlight as they dazzle and mesmerize.
Combining all the traits of gifted speakers I have observed, the speech magician has reached the status of a myth in my mind.
The speech magician, my imaginary paragon of all great speakers, can purposely shock and still come across as charming. He says what others are thinking, but are afraid to say. He breaks the tension and diverts with generous, sweeping gestures. He teases, he jokes, he flirts, he suggests, he says risky, honest things; he weaves around “the rules,” as if to mock them and show how silly they are.
For the speech magician, conversation is a game, and if the rules do not promote fun, he ignores them, and he does it with not only with approval – but applause.
He gets away with it because he understands that communication is not about rules; it is about purpose, and the rules exist to serve it, not the other way around.
The speech magician is like the James Joyce of speaking – not the slave of convention, but its master.
It is often the people who lack confidence, in both speaking and writing, who anxiously obsess over the rules, and imagine hidden ones designed to entrap and confound.
Just as insecure writers fret about not being “good,” the socially awkward person worries about saying the right thing, or whether what she says will make sense. The speech magician does not have to make sense. It is enough that he says everything with perfect confidence.
John Knowles, author of A Separate Peace, wrote that, in all great writing, there is “an element of play.” The same is true in speaking. For people who master either speaking or writing, communication is something to play with – not an unbending law book. Neil Gaimon said that writing, at its best, is like “flying through dreams.”
Great writers and speakers understand that the rules are useful, and they apply them expertly to serve their purpose – but mastery, in both speech and writing, is all about freedom.