on cadence: the most important element of good writing no one talks about

and how to improve yours (part 1 of 2)

Welcome back to Memoir Club.

I’ve missed you all terribly. Good news! We have now resumed our regularly scheduled Summer 2023 programming, after a brief hiatus in which I tended to my extended family crisis. As of today I shall resume posting my weekly essay on writing, inspiration and craft. My life crisis isn’t over, by the way, I just got bored of crying and filling out forms, and decided (quite rightly) to turn my mind to something more inspiring. It’s good to be back.

This week’s topic — cadence — is a tricky one. That’s why I’ll be tackling it in two posts.

First off, I’m going to risk a sweeping statement, which is that most (if not all) of good writing ultimately gets down to cadence. It’s the most important element of style (and substance) that no one talks about.

I’ve been trying to order my thoughts on the subject for some time now but I found myself holding off on this post for weeks, for reasons I did not entirely understand. In part I think it’s because the effect of cadence is so visceral, which makes it difficult to talk about. When it works on the page, there’s nothing quite like it. For me, good cadence is something I can feel in my body as I read or write — it vibrates my bones, penetrates flesh.

When people say “good writing can’t be taught,” they are really talking about cadence — because it’s intuitive. Some people just have it. Some don’t. But the truth is that most writers fall somewhere in between the two. And while it’s true you can’t force good cadence into being, you absolutely can create the conditions that will allow it to happen. In the next two posts I will show you how.