The rhythm in your writing can be sensed by readers. But what is this rhythm? And where does it come from?
This article covers:
Why there’s music in writing
Examples of rhythm in writing
What defines the rhythm of your content?
How to write with rhythm
Write with rhythm
Do you know whether your writing jigs or jives? Waltzes or boogies? Struts or strolls?
Most business writers ignore the power of rhythm.
They think rhythm is for poets, musicians, and dancers. Why would a business writer worry about something as esoteric as rhythm?
Well, have you ever worked out while listening to music? Did you notice how the cadence of the music influenced your speed of running, cycling or lifting weights?
You might not be aware of it, but a higher-tempo song makes you bounce a little faster. Your brain synchronizes with the tempo of the music; and, as neuroscientist Dr. Daniel Levitin argues, you might not even feel your muscles protesting because the music enhances your mood and increases your pain threshold.
There’s music in writing, too
Writing can stutter and stumble. Writing can flow so softly, it almost sends you to sleep. Writing can hop and skip, putting a smile on your face.
Rhythm is one of the most underrated aspects of writing.
Just like the music during your workout, your readers can sense the rhythm in your writing. Even when they aren’t reading your copy aloud, they can hear its rhythm because they listen to their inner speech. Inner speech mimics “outer” speech, using similar brain areas and even producing tiny movements in the muscles of your larynx.
Yucky rhythm can make your readers click away, while carefully composed rhythm can keep your readers engaged.
Music is what language would love to be if it could.
~ John O’Donohue
Want to know how rhythm can enhance your content?
Examples of rhythm in writing
Rhythm is easiest to spot in poetry, where the same cadence is repeated line after line. Here’s an example of Dr. Seuss:
I’m Yertle the Turtle!
Oh, marvelous me!
For I am the ruler
of all that I see!
Note how the stress pattern is the same in the first and third sentence, and also in the second and fourth. Stressed syllables in bold:
I’m Yertle the Turtle!
Oh, marvelous me!
For I am the ruler
of all that I see!
The rhythm in nursery rhymes and traditional poetry tends to be fairly rigid. But while prose and modern poetry don’t stick to a rigid pattern, you can still hear their rhythm.
Have you read On the Road by Jack Kerouac? It reads like the author is in a hurry to get his story shared. When reading, you hardly have time to take a breath, the sentences keep running, one after the other. Here’s an example:
I first met Dean not long after my wife and I split up. I had just gotten over a serious illness that I won’t bother to talk about, except that it had something to do with the miserably weary split-up and my feeling that everything was dead. With the coming of Dean Moriarty began the part of my life you could call my life on the road.
When you read a paragraph a couple of times, preferably aloud, you’ll get a better feel for its rhythm.
Notice how the rhythm of the description of the Ammo Can packaging from Man Crates below is similar to Jack Kerouac’s paragraph:
The NATO spec Ammo Can is air-tight, waterproof, and virtually indestructible. Even if your gift mistakenly gets shipped to the inside of an active volcano then shot into the middle of the ocean where the government is conducting nuclear test explosions, the contents will be safe and sound.
Rhythm creates a mood. Rhythm can make you rush ahead, or slow you down to quietly enjoy reading. In the paragraph below from All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, the pace ebbs and flows:
When she opens the bedroom window, the noise of the airplanes becomes louder. Otherwise, the night is dreadfully silent: no engines, no voices, no clatter. No sirens. No footfalls on the cobbles. Not even gulls. Just a high tide, one block away and six stories below, lapping at the base of the city walls.
And something else.
Something rattling softly, very close. She eases open the left-hand shutter and runs her fingers up the slats of the right. A sheet of paper has lodged there.
The pace of this paragraph from FiftyThree is quite similar:
We make stuff.
Beautiful, practical, meaningful stuff.
We make what we love.
We love what we do.But over the years, we noticed that somehow, along the way, software designed to help us be creative actually made us less creative. We believe the best ideas often emerge from the simplest tools: pencil and paper.
What defines the rhythm of your content?
In music, tone length and the silences in between tones define rhythm. When long notes blend together without silences, the music flows smoothly. In contrast, when you play short notes with clear pauses in between, you get a more abrupt style of playing. It wakes you up.
In writing, rhythm is defined by punctuation and the stress patterns of words in a sentence. Long sentences sound smoother, while short sentences make your content snappier.
When each sentence follows the same structure and rhythm, your writing becomes boring. For instance:
She went to the shop. She bought ingredients. She prepared Beef Rendang. She let it simmer for 5 hours. The house filled with exotic smells. She cooked rice. She waited for her husband. They ate a delicious dinner. She thought life was good.
By varying sentence length and structure, you can find a rhythm that suits your voice. Here’s an alternative version:
She went to the shop to buy ingredients. And when she prepared the Beef Rendang in the afternoon, exotic smells wafted through the house. After dinner, she whispered to her husband: “Life is good.”
Music doesn’t need words to be mesmerizing, moody, or upbeat. You sense its mood, and it impacts your state of mind.
In a similar way, the rhythm of your writing impacts your reader, too.
Rhythm is one of the most powerful of pleasures, and when we feel a pleasurable rhythm we hope it will continue. When it does, it grows sweeter.
~ Mary Oliver
How to write with rhythm
Next time you read a novel, pay attention to its rhythm. Where does the author let you pause? How does the author vary long and short sentences? How does the writing ebb and flow?
Do you notice a similar rhythm in the writing of your favorite authors?
After studying the rhythm of a few writers, go on and play with the rhythm of your own content. Experiment by varying sentence length. Try different sentence structures. Play with different words.
Read your content aloud.
And learn how to influence your reader’s mood.
Make your words dance.
PS Thank you to Barry Feldman for inspiring this post.
Recommended reading on rhythm in writing:
How to vary sentence length and shine a spotlight on your key points
How to write a dazzling long sentence
Word repetition: How to make your writing resonate like good music
You may also like:
29 ways to improve your writing skills (the essential list)
Many thanks for the insights. Let me go and make my words dance to the tune of my content.
Happy dancing! 🙂
Genius! Another genius angle to looking at writing.
Thank you so much, Stu. Happy writing!
I am thrilled to share my views on your writing advice. You, believe me, are the one whose blogs posts are some extra ordinary. The advice and the suggestions you share with us are not so common but are unique. I wish to possess the same intellect you have as a person and the same gravity you have in your writing. Love it.
Thank you so much for your compliment, Younis. Happy writing!
I’ve been watching, and listening to, Ken Burn’s Country Music on PBS television. Many of the writers of country music could not write music. They had stories. They had rhythm. They wrote great songs.
As writers of words we’re telling our stories and wanting others to listen. We vary sentence lengths and punctuations, and chose more dramatic words to make a statement. Telling that I’m in my ninety-fourth orbit of the sun grabs more attention than saying I’ve had my ninety-third birthday. I continue to learn. Thanks for your help.
I love this point: “Many of the writers of country music could not write music. They had stories. They had rhythm. They wrote great songs.”
Thank you so much for sharing that, Wayne. I had never thought about it like that.
As an amateur musician, the concept of rhythm is built in. Modern music sans flow and rhythm simply dies before my ears process it.
My writing is the same. A sentence, scene, chapter, or story that does not flow with emphasis and rhythm does not work as well as one that does. The words feel uncomfortable and off without rhythm.
Henneke has opened a window that shows us writers a glimpse of greatness.
I’m glad you agree about the importance of rhythm in our writing, Cliff. Thank you so much for stopping by!
From the beginning, I am hearing a short sentence. About long sentence with rhythmic benefit, I have learned from you today.
The rhythmic idea in business writing is a new adventure in my life.
thank you so much for your efforts.
Enjoy your new adventure of rhythm in writing, Hasan! 🙂
I like this, it’s really helping me become a better writer. Thank you so much!
Great! Happy writing, Maggie 🙂
Really great content, Henneke! I’m super glad I read your posts on writing, because all that just hit me in the head and say, “Oh, you sound pathetic!” And gave me the motivation to really practice and try to listen to my voice.
Thanks a lot, a lot and a lot! Besides I love your images!
What a lovely comment! I’m glad you’ve found the motivation to practice.
Happy writing, Ashley!
Here my problem is, I can write good poems in my native language but when I want to do that in English, I cannot just because I cannot find the harmonious words, this makes me sick. There should be a program for this to show you the harmonious words when you write a word down. Is this much to ask? 😀 🙂
I don’t write poetry, but I often use a thesaurus when I can’t find the right word.
That’s what the top professional (human) translators are for ;). Brodsky managed to write poetry in a non-native language, but only after living in the country for many years and picking the brains of several top translators along the way.
What a super fun and informative post. I advocate checking stressed and unstressed syllables even in prose. Thank you, Henneke, for a post filled with bubblegum and fizz.
Thank you, Robyn! And yes, rhythm is valid for prose, too. Most people undervalue how important rhythm is for prose.
Quite often, I find myself growing hungry on this blog. Must be your mentions of Beef Rendang. When will you post your favourite Rendang recipe?
Sometimes I get hungry while writing, too 😉
I’ve written down my Rendang recipe and included it as a surprise bonus in my guide for writing About pages. But perhaps I should post it somewhere on my blog, too? I’ll think about it!
Thanks for this post, Henneke. It really showed the differentiation between longer sentences vs. shorter ones. And while shorter ones are good and snappy and can wake you up, too much of it is overkill. And you can easily lose readers that way too.
A rhythm in writing is very important to keep readers on their toes and interested.
Excellent stuff here.
– Andrew
Yep, it’s always about variation and moderation. Too many long sentences are boring, but too many short sentences are exhausting, too.
Writing in general is fascinating, truly an art form in itself. Anyway great article:)
So true. And the wonderful thing is that we never get bored of studying art. There’s always more to discover, and other styles to experiment with.
You’re so right, Henneke: the rhythm of our writing makes all the difference to its enjoyability, and can even affect our understanding of its meaning. Even without reading a page aloud, we hear it in our heads – if you’ve ever read a fantasy novel with characters or places called things like Xfrhtl and Ploudm, you’ll know what I mean!
Exactly!
Wow Henneke I love this one especially, you truly are amazing, how you com up with ideas, it’s simply superb writing. Love you, Annamarie
Thank you, Annamarie. Happy dancing!
Oh, another piece in the puzzle of copywriting. Thanks, Henneke. It gets more interesting every time I read your fabulous posts that teach me so much, in a different way than I was taught. Thanks for that.
I do change up the length of my sentences, and create white space; I will pay even more attention to it now.
Thank you, Elvire. It’s fun to discover all these aspects of writing, isn’t it? I’m still discovering new things, too. The journey never ends (and I see that as a positive thing!).
Henneke – This is a post that makes you think hard about the things you’ve read. I never thought about writing having a rhythm. The examples you give are great; I especially liked the Man Crates quote.
The Man Crates copy is great. Very well targeted to their audience.
Thank you for stopping by, Patricia!
Hi Henneke,
Yes, rhythm is certainly something to think about in writing, including copy. It’s no coincidence Dr. Seuss was a great rhythmist (if that’s a word – if not, just pretend it is, Seuss-style ), he was also a brilliant copywriter. He led you into buying with the rhythm of his sales schpiel.
And Kerouac was so full of exploding experience that he couldn’t stop until he’d finished. His writing is like a journey too.
Rhythm is important. It helps you read and can keep people reading on or not. That’s why
reading your writing aloud is so helpful because what sounds great in your head, often doesn’t when it’s read aloud.
Your copy always reads well and sounds good too. I often read aloud to help myself with
reading.
Here’s wishing you lots of success with The Enchanting Copywriting course.
I like new words, so if it’s not in the dictionary yet, I’ll vote for adding rhythmist!
Thank you for your good luck wishes, Tom!
Hi Henneke,
Well, this certainly was useful!
You are right. Rhythm is absolutely one of the most underrated aspects of writing.
The last article I’ve read on this subject was quite disappointing. You always make your articles easy to consume and give them your own interesting twist.
The examples you provided we’re nice. The one for the Ammo Can packaging was excellent, I am very fond of bold copy like that.
Reading my content aloud is something I already do that helps a lot, especially for sales copy.
You seem to have mastered rhythm, so you can bet I’ll lurk around to see how you use it in some of your other posts 🙂
Enjoy the rest of your week Henneke.
– Jasper
I personally prefer the rhythm on FiftyThree – it gives me more time to savor the words 😉
But it’s a matter of personal preference. The one isn’t better than the other. It’s just different.
And yep, feel free to lurk around and steal my rhythm 😉
I read Kerouac’s “On the Road” twice when I was a travelin’ youngster and it was compelling both times. Also read several of his other books and he convinced me that writing did not have to adhere to all of the “rules” — the crucial rule was communicating so effectively to the reader that the reader could visualize, enjoy, be moved, be entertained, escape, feel strongly for or against something, learn…all of the reasons we write online “content” these days.
Thanks for the wonderful reminder, Henneke
I’ve only read “On the Road” quite recently. It’s interesting how much we can learn from reading novels and paying attention to writing styles.
Thank you for stopping by again, Stan.
Another wonderful piece of Henneke insight! I know about making sure sentences “move along” but never thought of them as lyrical i.e. words to music. Thanks Henneke, I’m have a good think about this. Paul
Great! Let me know how you get on? I’d love to hear whether you feel understanding rhythm makes a difference to your writing.
Spot on.
🙂
Thank you, Henneke. There is a beautiful music-like feel to good writing. I agree that mixing long, short (and medium) sentences give words a beautiful cadence. Reading aloud helps me find my best rhythm. Great tips.
Yep, and that music-like feel makes good writing a pleasure to read 🙂
Henneke, a reminder for the poet in all of us. Thanks.
Yep, just like we need to let our inner child fool around from time to time, we also need to let our inner poet play a little 🙂
Wonderful post AGAIN!
I like some of my posts and love some of them. I am going back to see if it is a rhythm issue. I look forward to practicing this technique on a conscious level.
Thanks Henneke.
Yes, that would be an interesting point to investigate! Let me know what you find out?
Henneke, great post!
Advertising writers train themselves to use rhythm to create headlines (and copy) that sticks in people’s heads. The fact that we all remember certain product slogans from our childhoods attests to the power of rhythm, and how it heightens our recall.
Those who believe the tagline is dead, don’t get this.
Written or spoken words have the power to trigger an emotional response when they mirror the rhythms of our inner feelings. As you point out, this is something you can be conscious of and you can practice. But eventually, you just feel it.
Yep, that’s it. You just feel it – that’s why I found it quite hard to explain.
And you make a good point about rhythm making it easier to remember slogans. The same is true for nursery rhymes. Both rhythm and rhyme help people remember lines.
Excellent post (as usual), Henneke. A few days ago I talked to someone about their website copy. To be honest: It sucks. Anyway, one major problem is its dullness. Every sentence is exactly built and as long as the one before. No variation. Just sleep-inducing, irksome (is that a word?) blandness. What most people don’t see: Some little tweaks can already have a huge impact on the readability of any given text. That’s what I’m trying, too when I write copy, blog posts, emails or even letters and WhatsApp messages. Why not make all of those more fun to read? 🙂 (If the rhythm of this comment sems to contradict all of what I’m saying, I hope I do better in my native language.) 🙂
Yep, I agree – even small tweaks can make a big difference in readability.
Your English is absolutely fine! Thank you for stopping by, Chris.
Hi Henneke,
Great examples of how business writing can also be pleasurable reading.
I love the paragraph from FiftyThree, in particular the undulating sentence “But over the years, we noticed that somehow, along the way, software designed to help us be creative actually made us less creative.” On the face of it, this sentence doesn’t seem essential. But the slower pace contrasts beautifully with the punchy final sentence, making the main message stand out.
The ebb and flow of the FiftyThree paragraph also helps to create an emotional response. The snappiness of the ending is uplifting.
Yes, and the long sentence also contrasts beautifully with the short sentences before hand.
If you’d be editing the text, you might be tempted to tighten the long sentence and remove “somehow, along the way” as it doesn’t feel essential. But removing these words kills the flow of the sentence: “But over the years, we noticed that software designed to help us be creative made us less creative.”
Fascinating, isn’t it?
PS Have you read the novel “All the Light We Cannot See” by Anthony Doerr? I think you might like it.
Hello Henneke,
Loved today’s post. Rythm and harmony in texts and design is very important, and somehow these two are ignored in general. There’s science among rythm and harmony which makes us like things.
I missed the “Make your content swing and swirl” step guide. Maybe for a future article?
Yeah, I guess I haven’t quite figured out how to create a step-by-step guide for rhythm in writing – other than recommending to try to “absorb” the concept of rhythm by paying more attention to it and then practicing and experimenting.
I’ll keep thinking. Perhaps I can come up with something. A guide to dancing with words 😉
Hi Henneke,
I like this idea a lot. It’s like if you imagine the words had an actual shape to them and the sentences created a visual pattern that had a flow and harmony that carried you along.
Like a song 🙂
I was looking at some sheet piano music recently and even though I can’t read music, could get an idea of how it sounded from the elegant shape and visual flow of the notes.
Thanks for the enlightening new perspective on business writing, is really interesting!
I like that way of thinking … the words that are stressed might have bigger shapes than the words that aren’t stressed.
I think the sounds of the words also have an influence on perceived harmony. Words with strong letters like “k” or “p” sound harsher than words with “sh”.
Brilliant post, Henneke! I have never seen this discussed *anywhere* and it’s absolutely key One way we can check our own rhythm is to follow the commonly prescribed (but widely disregarded) advice to “Read your copy aloud.” I’ve even heard the suggestion to “sing” your copy… maybe that’s why we sometimes say the copy “sings” when it seems to flow just right into place.
I’m a very bad singer, so I won’t try singing my blog posts 😉
But reading aloud definitely helps a ton.
I always know that there’s rhythm is music, poetry, drawings and paintings. I just never thought about rhythm in business writing. But now you bring it up, wow, of course!
Yep, so true. I didn’t think about it while writing this post, but there’s also rhythm in drawings, and paintings, and architecture. Once you start looking for rhythm, it’s everywhere 🙂
Thanks for this Henneke. It’s made me realise I do focus on rythm but not consciously. Fortunately, the examples you use are excellent and make it easier for me to step back and be a bit more analytical about my writing in future.
Do you know if there are certain rythms that are proven to work best to encourage sign ups? You know, slow, slow, quick, quick, slow. Or something like that.
I’ve not found a magic rhythm yet. 😉
However, I’d say that short, quick and powerful is best for a call to action. Check out this post: https://www.enchantingmarketing.com/how-to-make-words-more-powerful/