Write like Hemingway? There's an app for that

February 12, 2014 Updated: February 12, 2014 9:26pm

People are always looking for ways to wonderfully improve their writing.

No, make that: People are always looking for ways to improve their writing.

That edit is thanks to HemingwayApp.com, a website that spread virally through social media Wednesday by suggesting changes that make any Web user's writing resemble Ernest Hemingway's sparse prose.

Of course, the site's promises sound like snake oil, but what HemingwayApp.com does is flag adverbs, unclear sentences and uses of passive voice. The Internet buzz is partially due to the site's lofty literary branding, but also because the tool does deliver some benefit.

Highlighting pointless adverbs and confusing sentences will no doubt help writers - especially those who haven't taken a writing class since high school.

For fun I turned the editor loose on a short passage from Hemingway's "For Whom the Bell Tolls":


The site flagged the sentence as far too long, and identified one questionable adverb ("smally") and two ambiguities ("all of"). It also misunderstood the mention of a color ("was red") as passive voice.

Of course, when put in the context of the entire literary work, the site's suggested edits are ridiculous. That sentence is a work of art - and its length is what makes it so memorable.

Perhaps it's true that the only true rule of writing is that there are no rules in writing.

That means it's pretty tricky to distill instructions into computer code and make a machine into an editor. At this point in its development, always heeding the edits of HemingwayApp.com yields boring - and sometimes confusing - prose.

There are reasons to avoid winding sentences, adverbs and the passive voice - but there are also reasons to use such devices as tools. True edits take into account the entire work, not sentences in vacuums. Though people often think of Hemingway's brevity, sentences like the above excerpt can be found throughout his work, serving as lyrical knockout punches set up by rhythmic jabs of short sentences.

That context, that rhythm and that emotional enjoyment we derive from a graceful shift in pace is far harder to teach a machine.

Brevity isn't the only thing that makes Hemingway's prose great - there's also his tone, cadence and empathy. For now, that capability in a computer appears a long way off.


Caleb Garling

Caleb Garling

Business Reporter