英文写作中句子越长越好吗

很多同学在写作学习中倾向于写长句，或被告知句子结构越复杂越能体现自己的语法水平。但，真的是这样吗？我们来看一个例子：

Personally, actions speak louder than words, and good role modeling from parents and teachers firstly ought to be provided, concerning personal safety, social rules, and moral characters, rather than just giving orders. If some regulations are needed, it is wise enough to listen to children’s opinions as equals beforehand, seeking to take account of both the goals and children’s individual circumstances, so as to maximize the efficiency of demands.

读完之后，有没有觉得比较费劲而又不得要点。那么改成如下的形式是否更容易理解？

Personally, I think in order to make children well-behaved social members, parents and teachers should provide a good role model rather than just lecturing. If regulation is really needed, it is wise for adults to treat children as independent individuals, seeking their opinions and finally finding a solution acceptable to both sides.

为什么有些同学写长句会起到反作用。其实有三方面的原因，一个是认知误区——长既是好。二是语法基础不扎实，驾驭不了复杂的语义，三是不能清晰地思考（unable to think clearly），包括使用一些中式思维的空话（大家听一听一些大会的报告就知道什么是空话）。第三点最致命，例如上文中的individual circumstances, maximize the efficiency of demands。

在我的写作教学过程中也经常碰到这类情况，有些学生的作文每一句都是长句，而且还充斥着自己学到的新词汇，却没有一句是全对的，导致我根本无法下手修改，恨不得替他们重写。我曾告诉一个学生，你要抛弃这种写法，用你最熟悉的中学词汇去表达一个句子，不要在意长度，一个句子只需表达清楚一种意思即可。（当然这种方式并不是针对所有学写作的学生，是针对那些fail to make themselves understood的学生），她听了之后恍然大悟，后来就流畅多了，可以比较清楚地表达她自己了。

那么除了语法比较薄弱、逻辑比较混乱的学生，是否其他学生就不会犯以上错误了？答案是否定的，几乎每个人都难免会犯redundancy（赘述）的错误，native speakers也不例外。就如我们用中文写文章也难免啰里吧嗦。在On Writing Well这本写作书中，作者写道：

But the secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components. Every word that serves no function, every long word that could be a short word, every adverb that carries the same meaning that"s already in the verb, every passive construction that leaves the reader unsure of who is doing what— these are the thousand and one adulterants that weaken the strength of a sentence.

这段话的意思是：好的文章就是每个句子是由最简洁的成分构成。有许多掺杂物会削弱一个句子的力量，包括不起任何作用的单词、本可以由短词替代的长词，意思已包含在动词中的副词，读者看了之后依旧不清楚“谁做了什么”的被动语态。

这其实给了我们一个很好的依据去检验我们自己的文章，精简每个句子，从而提升语义密度。

例如Due to the pandemic, millions of people have lost their lives. 是一个acceptable的句子。但优化后的The pandemic has cost millions of lives. 读起来就更有力量。

接下来我们来看一下更多的学生的例子。

语义重复是最常见的现象，即two words serve the same function，应去掉一个。如

1）Children are individuals and alone, physically and mentally.

此句中individual和alone就重复了，另外，需要加physically吗？身体上谁不是独立的？显然是画蛇添足。所以可以改成：

Children are mentally independent individuals.

2）To make their choices is to know themselves. They know their likes and dislikes, their desires and something unwanted in the process of it.

此句中make their choices和句末的it重复，likes和desires，dislikes和something unwanted区分度不大，且句子结构有点松散，建议改成：

In the process of making choices, they get to know themselves, including their likes and dislikes.

3）Students are facing plenty of competitions that they are under much pressure to go beyond others, which makes them feeling tired and anxious every day.

此句中plenty of与much重复，competitions与go beyond others重复，建议改成：

Students are under great pressure of constantly competing with others, thus feeling tired and anxious every day.

其次，句子中会出现一些无关信息或不必要信息，应删除，如

1）Worse, the relationship between parents and children seems not to be satisfactory, even abnormal.

not to be satisfactory只是一个模糊的范围，而后面的abnormal已给出了更具体的说明，由此可见前者可以删除。另外亲子关系可以有更简洁的表达parent-child relationship。所以，修改后的句子如下

Worse, the parent-child relationship seems abnormal.

2）As two main ways of education, parenting and schooling education with a variety of specific patterns, including those where children are asked to do whatever parents demand, correspondingly produce children with diverse performance, especially in their characters after growing up.

这句话中前半部讲家庭教育和学校教育有多种形式，而后半部只讲孩子只听父母的话会造成什么后果。两种意思没有明显逻辑关系，应将前半部去掉，修改为

One parenting mode requires children to do whatever their parents demand, which, however, leads to diverse behavior patterns in children, further influencing their character in their later life.

3）Of course parents always act for their children’s good, and the safety of their children is the primary concern for parents, as well as social intercourse, whether it be respecting and obeying social rules or being polite when interacting with others.

此句中前面“父母总是为孩子好的”是否听起来很鸡肋，此外，social intercourse和interacting with others重复了。经修改，句子如下

Apart from safety, parents are also concerned about children’s social intercourse, like whether children can respect others or obey social rules.

最后，要尽可能杜绝空话，如

Teachers and schools should give less pressure to students and develop what they really interested in ,thus making a positive phenomenon and essentially increase their scores,and also can earn a good reputation.

什么是making a positive phenomenon？再说make和phenomenon可以搭配吗？一定要去理解a positive phenomenon，我想后面学生成绩的提高和学校声誉的改善也足以表达正面的影响了。所以改成

Schools should reduce pressure on students and develop what they are really interested in, which can improve their scores and earn schools a good reputation in return.

看完以上的分析，大家是否对如何simplify a sentence有点概念了？不妨经常去翻翻自己的作文，看看有无优化的地方。