Writing in English, the language of the non-natives
The truth is writing in English is as beautiful as it is hard, and this is something even professional writers deal with on a regular basis
“I’m a writer.”
I have always admired people who can give that answer when they get asked what they do. It’s a less fancy way of saying that you’re an artist. Writing is indeed a form of art, and just like drawing, or learning a musical instrument, it’s a form of art that anyone can master with enough practice. Writing can be a way of expressing yourself, connecting with others, and understanding your own thoughts. Becoming a better writer is a superpower available to everybody.
All that freedom and self-awareness come at a cost though, especially to non-native English speakers. Writing in English can be challenging and, at times, frustrating. As a Spanish native speaker, I can relate to this. More often than not, the words do not come to me. Saying that I barely stop writing mid-sentence to make a quick internet search to make sure I am using a certain word or idiom correctly would be a blatant lie. Denying that I have the Merriam-Webster Dictionary in my browser’s Bookmarks Toolbar would be useless. The truth is writing in English is as beautiful as it is hard, and this is something even professional writers deal with on a regular basis.
In her best-selling book Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, Anne Lamott debunks the myth that professional writers “sit down at their desks every morning feeling like a million dollars, feeling great about who they are and how much talent they have and what a great story they have to tell; that they take in a few deep breaths, push back their sleeves, roll their necks a few times to get all the cricks out, and dive in, typing fully formed passages as fast as a court reporter.” I have found comfort in these words. I understood that the writing process is complex and cannot be mastered in a few days, weeks, or months. It only gets better with time.
The only way to get better at writing is to practice it. Still, it would be unrealistic to think mistakes are never going to pop up to remind us of our linguistic limitations. Basically, we get better by learning from our own mistakes and from the experiences of others: people like Gabi and Raquel, members of the Community team at Unbabel, who kindly shared their thoughts on writing in English as non-natives.
“It only gets better with time.”
Even though everyone has their own path to becoming a writer, usually non-natives start writing in English once they find themselves in a professional setting. That was the case with Gabi, for example; studying journalism and doing an exchange program in Canada helped her to develop her writing skills. “In the beginning,” she recalls, “it was really hard to develop a unique style, but even harder because I wanted to think in Portuguese and then translate to English.”
Raquel’s writerly origins, however, were not professional — she wrote short stories, trying to emulate her favorite books. Finding her own style was an issue for her too. When Raquel thought back to one of her first pieces of writing, there was a lot of what she would now call ‘TV English’ — writing like a character in a TV show instead of herself.
I’m somewhere in the middle of the two of them. I got serious about writing in English back in 2018 when I first learned about remote work. So there I was, an enthusiastic yet inexperienced (and naive) jobseeker, answering the typical job application questions and sending an avalanche of poorly-customized boilerplate cover letters. That is how filling job applications became my go-to method to unknowingly improve my writing skills. Having a considerable amount of keystrokes under my belt — or, more appropriately, under my fingers — did help me realize my writing could use some work.
“Once I became aware of where I needed to improve, addressing these issues and getting better became easier.”
After my first experiences, it became more obvious where I needed to focus my attention. In varying degrees, it was grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, sentence flow, style, or all of the above. Once I became aware of where I needed to improve, addressing these issues and getting better became easier.
Gabi and Raquel know very well that there are no shortcuts when it comes to getting better at writing, and agree that being an avid reader is the best way to write professionally as a non-native speaker. Gabi recommends paying attention to the style of the author and the resources they use to make the text compelling. Raquel adds that “deconstructing [the piece of writing] to understand how it was put together and what it’s trying to do.”
Picking a favorite sentence, a golden nugget that deserves to be shared with the world, is an excellent way of getting used to active reading. But this is just half the process. The most important thing is trying to explain what makes that sentence unique. Is it the way the writer arranged the words? Its thought-provoking or persuasive nature? Its simplicity or depth? Nonetheless, writing itself, as mentioned earlier, should not be neglected. “It’s like learning how to cook, you’d only get better at it if you keep cooking, then you’ll find the right quantity, temperature, etc.,” Gabi notes. And I couldn’t agree more.
“It’s like learning how to cook, you’d only get better at it if you keep cooking, then you’ll find the right quantity, temperature, etc.”
It’s important to remember that first drafts will always suck, and the sooner a writer accepts that reality, the better. Raquel is a good example of this. She tries “to just push the first draft out, no matter how terrible it is, and do most of the fun work on the editing stage.” It’s very important to realize that writing is only half the job, and to be an excellent writer you also need to be an excellent editor. Paul Valéry, a 12-time nominee for the Nobel Prize in literature, said that “a work is never truly completed…but abandoned.” Or, as I like to paraphrase this timeless principle, writing is not for perfectionists. “Keep writing,” Gabi says, “even if you don’t think it’s good, it’ll get better with time.”
Writing, as a form of communication and art, must be enjoyed and can always be improved. Writing in English, more specifically, opens up a door to all those who are willing to step up and seize the opportunity to share their thoughts in a language that has already brought us together.
