The Benjamin Franklin Method: How to (Actually) Learn to Write

Charles Chu Blocked Unblock Follow Following Dec 7, 2016

Benjamin Franklin may be the most prolific man in all of American history.

In his NYT bestselling Benjamin Franklin: An American Life, Walter Isaacson writes of Franklin —

“[He was] the most accomplished American of his age and the most influential in inventing the type of society America would become.”

Franklin’s literal rags to riches story is jam-packed with insights on writing and a better life.

Born into poverty with 16 siblings, Franklin dropped out of school at age 10. How did Benjamin Franklin go from primary school dropout to the most accomplished American in all of history?

I wanted to find out.

In my own quest to teach myself how to write, I dug into Franklin’s autobiography. Guess what? He wasn’t born with it.

By his late twenties, Franklin had become independently wealthy through his publications of the Pennsylvania Gazette and his famed Poor Richard’s Almanack.

Yet, as a teenager, Franklin was not a good at writing. Determined to improve but with no teachers and no money, he decided to teach himself.

His autobiography tells exactly how he did it.

Most writing advice today sucks. It’s palm-in-face bad. Internet forums are infected with impractical advice like “just read more” or “keep trying kiddo!”.

Franklin’s advice, written almost 200 years ago, is the cure. He offers specific, actionable and immediate steps you can use to start improving your writing today.

Let’s dig in…

1. DISSECT AND RECONSTRUCT

At age 16, Ben finds out he’s bad at writing. His spelling and grammar are good, but…

“I fell far short in elegance of expression, in method and in perspicuity…”

(Perspicuity means “clarity”. I didn’t know it either.)

Determined to improve, Ben takes up one of his favorite magazines, The Spectator…

“I took some of the papers, and, making short hints of the sentiment in each sentence, laid them by a few days, and then, without looking at the book, try’d to compleat the papers again, by expressing each hinted sentiment at length, and as fully as it had been expressed before, in any suitable words that should come to hand. Then I compared my Spectator with the original, discovered some of my faults, and corrected them.”

Wow, that’s some practical advice.

Here it is again: