Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process

by John McPhee

Recipient of the Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement AwardDraft No. 4 is a master class on the writer's craft. John McPhee shares insights he has gathered over his long career, and has refined while teaching at Princeton University, where he has nurtured some of the most highly regarded writers of our time. He discusses structure, diction and tone, observing that 'readers are not supposed to notice the structure. It is meant to be about as visible as someone's bones.' This book is a vivid depiction of the writing process, from reporting to drafting to revising - and revising and revising.

Genres: Writing, Nonfiction, Essays, Memoir, Crafts, Biography, Reference

208 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

John Angus McPhee is an American writer. He is considered one of the pioneers of creative nonfiction. He is a four-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in the category General Nonfiction, and he won that award on the fourth occasion in 1999 for Annals of the Former World (a collection of five books, including two of his previous Pulitzer finalists). In 2008, he received the George Polk Career Award for his "indelible mark on American journalism during his nearly half-century career". Since 1974, McPhee has been the Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton University.

Reviews

[Adam Dalva · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun, insightful collection of linked essays (all of which appeared in The New Yorker) that detail various aspects of McPhee's approach to "creative non-fiction" - a phrase that both he and I find inscrutable. That notwithstanding, I'm teaching an intermediate "creative non-fiction" class this Spring, and I found several of these pieces quite helpful.

I was particularly drawn to the section on non-chronological structure, though McPhee's drawings of his essay schematics are completely incomprehensible to anyone but him. (At one point he proudly presents a spiral with several dots on it, but no X or Y Axis.). There is also value in his lessons about 4th drafts (use a dictionary to check any word that doesn't sing), interviews (playing dumb can be more useful than anything else), and description ("A thousand details add up to one impression").

What kept me blasting through this was not, however, the advice that I will pull out and present to my students, but McPhee's personal touch. The anecdotes about Richard Burton, William Shawn, Bob Gottlieb, and especially the terminal one about Dwight Eisenhower are wonderful, and his rendition of various technical aspects of his writing career - his use of a computer in the 1980s; The New Yorker's legendary fact checking department; fights with editors; "greening" lines at Time in the 60's - were most fascinating at all.

DRAFT NO. 4 has an appealing lightness, and though much of it won't lodge in memory, it is structured beautifully and works on several levels, as advertised. For fans of McPhee, or the genre.

[Darwin8u · Rating 4 out of 5]

"It is possible in managing a quote--not to say manipulating a quote--to present something that is both verbatim and false."
- John McPhee, Draft No. 4



John McPhee is a God. Not a minor deity either. A big "G" god. He isn't just good at the craft of writing nonfiction, he is the craft. Or at least that is how he seems. This perception, this read, of John McPhee only grows the more of his books, articles, etc., the reader consumes. You don't have to be passionate about geology. It is OK. McPhee is. You don't have to care about oranges. McPhee does. What happens is his writing, his interests, his ability to construct a story from the perfect characters and the right place transforms not just the object of McPhee's interest, but the reader. Am I sounding too passionate about this man? Well, of course I'm passionate. I love to read and John McPhee contains multitudes.

Not only is he the Master at the New Yorker, but he has for years (probably since I was near tit) taught writing at Princeton (where he went to school). Can you imagine? Seriously, if I could chose between a $1 million and the ability to audit his course on Creative Nonfiction (JRN 240/CWR 240), I might just say F-it to the money. He has nurtured readers and writers for years. Some of the direct fruit of the McPhee tree include:

- David Remnick (now his editor at the New Yorker)
- Richard Stengel (managing editor of Time magazine)
- Jim Kelly (former managing editor of Time)
- Robert Wright (former senior editor at The New Republic)
- Jennifer Weiner

And many, many more including at least two of his daughters (Jenny and Martha). He really is the godfather (or at least one of the godfathers) of New New Journalism. In an age when good writing seems to be as rare as good readers (dammit, I should probably scratch that pun, too easy), it is nice to read about the craftsmanship of writing from one of the masters.

'Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process' collects eight essays on writing that McPhee has published in the New Yorker (McPhee's home since before I was born). They are:

Progression - 11/14/2014
Structure - 01/14/2013
Editors & Publisher - 07/02/2012
Elicitation - 04/07/2014
Frame of Reference - 03/09/2015
Checkpoints - 02/09/2009
Draft No. 4 - 04/29/2013
Omission - 09/14/2014

[William2 · Rating 5 out of 5]

John McPhee is so nimble a writer that even this book on writing is beautifully written, engrossing even. And how often can you say that about other writing manuals? It helps that it’s part memoir — and does he ever have stories to tell. There are stories about his writing students; mini-profiles of everyone; a eulogy of his publisher, Roger Strauss, etc. He uses these examples to illustrate his technique. Some examples are very funny.

How he has over the years proactively used The New Yorker’s fact checking department is fascinating. The lengths gone to— dozens of phone calls— to ensure that one analogy is correct – astonishing. Two of McPhee‘s daughters are novelists. Here’s an excerpt from a letter he wrote to one (Jenny) when she was attending Princeton High School.

“The way to do a piece of writing is three or four times over, never once. For me, the hardest part comes first, getting something-anything— out in front of me. Sometimes in a nervous frenzy I just fling words as if I were flinging mud at a wall. Blurt out, heave out, babble out something-anything—as a first draft. With that, you have achieved a sort of nucleus. Then, as you work it over and alter it, you begin to shape sentences that score higher with the ear and eye. Edit it again-top to bottom. The chances are that about now you'll be seeing something that you are sort of eager for others to see. And all that takes time.” (p.159)

It’s a joy to be in such capable hands. Whether you’re a fiction or non-fiction writer, reading this book closely will repay you manyfold.

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book comprises essays McPhee wrote in his many years at The New Yorker. While you will find advice on writing (McPhee also taught writing courses at Princeton), you'll mostly find memoir-like reminisces about New Yorker editors (William Shawn, Robert Gottlieb, mostly) and writers (Calvin Trillin, chiefly).

My least favorite essay was "Structure," which went on and on about design and planning (gee, what does that say about ME?). My favorites were "Editors & Publisher" (lots of anecdotes about the grand days in New York), "Frame of Reference" (quirky, but funny instances of the short shelf-life of allusions), "Draft No. 4" (this has the most writing advice), and finally "Omission" (what you leave out is as important as what you put in).

I could go on, but I'll take the lessons of "Omission" and stop here.

[Roy Lotz · Rating 4 out of 5]

I include what interests me and exclude what doesn’t interest me. That may be a crude tool but it’s the only one I have.

I came to this book from an odd angle. Neither a reader of The New Yorker (where McPhee has published the lion’s share of his work), nor a reader of John McPhee’s books, nor even aware of his existence until a few months ago, I was nonetheless gifted this book for Christmas. It was an intelligent choice. McPhee is a kindred spirit, a nonfiction writer who loves nature, science, and the written word; whose rapacious curiosity for apparently prosaic subjects—oranges, rocks, the merchant marine—is only matched by his rapacious attention to the craft of writing.

Among a certain crowd of readers and writers McPhee is worshipped this side of idolatry. In this way he strongly resembles another writer for The New Yorker, E.B. White, whose style has become synonymous with good taste. The two men, very unlike in many ways, share something more: an odd mixture of down-home folksiness and slick sophistication. Their tone is frank and unpretentious, their subjects far removed from the shibboleths of high culture, and yet their writing is polished, refined, and consummate.

This book is presented as the written version of McPhee’s famous class on creative nonfiction at Princeton, which he has been teaching for over 40 years. This class is a part of the McPhee legend, since so many of its students went on to become highly regarded writers themselves. (There does seem to be a problem of cause-and-effect in attributing this success to the class, however, since to join the class you need to submit a writing sample, and only the best 16 are admitted.) As such, I opened this book expecting to find something like a style manual or a writing guide.

But Draft No. 4 is only peripherally concerned with giving advice. It is primarily a series of essays on his experience writing, researching, editing, fact-checking, and publishing. I admit that I was disappointed with this at first, since I was hoping for a focused series of tips and exercises, something along the lines of William Zinsser’s On Writing Well; but McPhee writes so charmingly that these misgivings were soon forgotten. Indeed, I had trouble putting the book down, and in short order finished it.

The most memorable chapter of the book is “Structure,” in which he illustrates some of the organizational schemes he has employed. McPhee, you see, is deeply concerned with the structure of his writing, in ways that I didn’t even imagine possible. In writing I tend to think of structure linearly, as an unbroken arc of meaning; but McPhee has the mind of a modern architect, and his arrangements are far more intricate. He illustrates these arrangements with idiosyncratic diagrams—incomprehensible to all but him. The diagram for Encounters with the Archdruid, for example, consists of the letters A, B, and C over a line, with D underneath. What does this mean?

In the rest of the book we are given several snapshots of his career. We see him interviewing Woody Allen (“a latent heterosexual”), learning to use Kedit (an arcane software program that he uses to organize his material), inventing bad puns as a young writer for Time, working with (and sometimes against) The New Yorker’s famously assiduous fact-checking department, negotiating the perils of editors, house-styles, and publishing deals, and other adventures in the life of a nonfiction writer.

The writing advice interspersed between these anecdotes, collected together, would likely not amount to a page and a half. And I must say the advice did not grab me. After long enough, all council on the craft of writing begins to sound the same: omit, condense, search for the right word, start with a strong lead, etc., etc. John McPhee’s emotional guidance is also in line with a noble tradition: writing is herculean, writers are masochists, writer’s block is the seventh layer of hell, and so on. Parenthetically, I think writers ought to stop complaining about writing or wallowing in its struggles. To me it always comes across as shamelessly melodramatic.

All carping aside, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. McPhee has clearly earned his reputation as a master of the craft. Each line of every essay exhibits intelligence, taste, and care. He is full of stories and knows how to tell them; and, true to form, he knows how to weave these stories into a satisfying whole. I look forward to reading more of McPhee, particularly Annals of the Former World, and in the meantime will hope that some of his obsessive care for the art of writing has rubbed off.

[Mehrsa · Rating 5 out of 5]

The second I finished the book, I started it again and re-read it. I love New Yorker Non-fiction essays and McPhee is the master of the genre. This book is a gem for writers and readers. A good writer like McPhee doesn't come too often and it's such a gift to readers when a writer assumes intelligence and edits appropriately. You know as a reader when you are being pandered to or given too much or not being respected. McPhee understands how to give readers enough, but not too much. He takes the time to shape a piece so it comes alive. I think I will read this book every year from now on, but I will always know that I will never write like he does. Thats ok though. Just happy there are others who respect the craft like he does.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

You might imagine that, as someone who writes all day, and therefore thinks about writing most of the day, I might not want to spend my off hours thinking about writing more. But you'd be wrong. I really like reading books on craft, especially if they're crafty themselves, and this absolutely qualifies. I love John McPhee's writing, no matter how arcane his subjects are—he manages to be both playful and precise, with the one dependent on the other. It makes me happy as both a reader and a writer, and I love how he talks about it here, addressing both of those aspects and a few other things besides. I actually picked up a few tips along the way, too, which is always a welcome side effect of reading writers on writing.

Full disclosure: McPhee came and talked to my sixth-grade class about essay writing, which I'm pretty sure I hadn't known was an actual thing until he said so, but I fell in love with the idea, as he presented it, right away. And here I am 53 years later still in love with it, so I guess I can blame him for all this thinking about writing in the first place.

ETA: *43* years later! Jeez, I don’t need to add any in that aren’t there already.

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a book on how to write but a book about John McPhee's writing and teaching career, I loved his chapter on revision. He writes four drafts for everything he writes, the first takes the longest the fourth goes much quicker that's how the book got it's title. Another interesting essay in the book is about copy checking, if that was done consistently today across the internet maybe we wouldn't have fake news. I loved the fact checking part about the Japanese bomb balloons that shut down the reactor used to create the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki.

[Matthew Errico · Rating 4 out of 5]

No book on writing made me think more about STRUCTURE. He approaches organizational patterns like a mad scientist. How should the piece unfold? Could it be structured in a more effective way? A more interesting way? A more dramatic way? Should the hook be this or that? Start with the END and then go back to the beginning? Separate into sections? With or without headings? The questions go on and on and on... And I guess that's the point.

[Stephen Durrant · Rating 4 out of 5]

McPhee is one of our best writers of non-fiction, and in this short book he does two things: first, report his own long experience as a writer at the New Yorker and elsewhere; and second, provide an array of good advice for aspiring writers. Particularly useful, I thought, were his comments on structure and upon what he calls "omissions"--that most difficult task of deciding what things are best left out. Most captivating, however, are his anecdotes, some very funny about interactions with editors.

[John Madera · Rating 3 out of 5]

John McPhee's Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process is a disappointing read that relies heavily on gossipy anecdote, useless diagrams, and gem-like paragraphs drawn from the author's work, only to say about the last, essentially, "Go and do likewise," all to basically hammer in largely well-worn ideas about writing.

[Kassandra · Rating 1 out of 5]

A tedious memoir of a white man in an old boy's club with very little actual advice about writing. Read "Bird by Bird" by Anne Lamott instead, which was both entertaining and informative. This book, in contrast, just smacked of white male privilege every which way. Glad it is over.

[Kristin Boldon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like listening to a cool grandfather telling good stories, with writing advice and a beautiful dry humor to boot. Lovely and useful.

[Ben Goldfarb · Rating 5 out of 5]

So much to love in this book, but I especially appreciated JM's advice on dealing with editors: "There are people who superimpose their own patterns on the work of writers and seem to think it is their role to force things in the direction they would have gone in if they had been doing the writing. Such people are called editors, and are not editors but rewriters... My advice is, never stop battling for your own unique stamp. An editor can contribute a lot to your thoughts but the piece is yours — and ought to be yours — if it is under your name."

[Heidi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Treasure hunt!

McPhee drops his gems on writing process into a jewel box of colourful stories and examples. You have to wait, or hunt, for them. Being more of a nuts-and-bolts reader when it comes to learning about writers’ craft, I don’t always relate to this approach—but I did this time. Mostly.

Many gems were so uncommon and instructive, and several anecdotes, writing samples and bolts of humour so revealing and fun, they smothered my impatience.

Among the lessons I most appreciated:
Reveal structure in diagram.
Preconceive leads and endings.
Defend the writer’s unique stamp.
Know when and when not to “dust quotes.”
Allow “Dear Mother” to help with writer’s block.
Make creative room for readers.
Spend time “greening.”

I had a “universe talking to me” moment when I turned to the chapter called “Frame of Reference,” literally just as I was grappling with whether or not to insert long, lean and lanky Gary Cooper in a short story about my first kiss. That’s cheating, McPhee says. He calls it “borrowed vividness,” and admonishes writers to do their own work. With regret, I’ve sent Cooper on his slow-walking, loose-jointed, narrow-hipped way down the street and off my page. My readers wouldn’t have known who he was, anyway.

The chapter called “Draft No. 4” on copyediting bears a second reading. But the one called “Checkpoints” nearly did me in: names, titles, war lore, too much. It redeemed itself with the anecdote about the golden-haired woman—“the sort of body you go to see in marble”—who unclasps her black-and-gold bathing suit top while in a game of chicken with another boat. I kind of forget now what that story was illustrating. Who cares.

Underlining, exclamation marks, laughing faces: tons of pencil marks in my copy of this wonderfully worthwhile book.

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve said elsewhere McPhee is ideal for readers who’ve seen through Tom Wolfe and outgrown Hunter Thompson. His approach is the opposite of theirs, in that the subject always comes first. There is no condescension, typographical tics, or tweaking of the facts. He becomes what he observes.

All the articles collected here are crisply written, modest, unflashy, and they pass on some hard-won experience clearly. They need to. Many passages deal with the neurotic tangle of structuring a piece of writing and these are likely to lose more than a few lay readers. What the essays impart is gladdening: McPhee, Pulitzer Prize winner and surely one of America's greatest living writers, is still terrified of the blank page, finds producing each new piece harder than the last, and hates grinding out first drafts.

You wouldn't think it to read him. He is as elegant and adroit as E.B. White. Like White, McPhee applauds the world and all its oddities, collecting facts and odd scraps of knowledge the way schoolkids collect stickers. I doubt there are many Brits, let alone Americans, who know the term for people from Wolverhampton is ‘Wulfrunian.' Long may McPhee continue.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

If you're not already a McPhee fan and you're merely looking to read a book on writing, I wouldn't go with this one. There are several valuable takeaways, but you have to hunt for them in a sea of quotations from his earlier works.

[Rodolfo Paiz · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book makes a simple promise: to help the writer, or aspiring writer, write better. But what I learned from this book could have been said in under one-tenth the space. The rest of the book is just an opportunity for Mr. McPhee to generate additional income by recycling previously-published material. In the end, I learned some things and read 200+ pages of well-written prose. But had I known what it contained ahead of time, I would have spent my time elsewhere.

McPhee’s writing is excellent and interesting; and if I’d wanted to read a collection of essays from an accomplished author that were only tangentially related to the writing process, I would probably have enjoyed it very much. Yes, there are some wonderful pearls of wisdom in there somewhere which (God bless the irregular restrictive which) will help a writer who has fortitude and patience to chew through the entire book in search of them.

But I thought Mr. McPhee would spend those 200+ pages actually discussing the writing process, and I regard the actual content of the book somewhere between the failure to deliver on a promise and a deliberate bait-and-switch false promise to its buyer. Not recommended for the educational value of its contributions “on the writing process”, but quite good if you’re interesting in reading a semi-autobiographical collection of essays that also happen to discuss the writing process along the way.

[Augustin Erba · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to love this book. As a regular reader - and an admirer - of The New Yorker, I expected a great read. Instead I struggled. There was nothing wrong with the prose. There was nothing wrong with the subject; as a writer who read too many books on writing, I expect that every publisher's response to a book-on-writing-pitch should be to ask if the advance should be four or five figures. There was nothing wrong with the constant name-dropping or the humblebrags; if you're a writer of McPhee's caliber and in your 80s you get away with pretty much anything in that department.
The last chapter was a lesson in the value of shortening your pieces and it spoke about the things left out and what they mean. I think what is missing in this book (or rather, this collection of essays previously published in The New Yorker), is a sense of urgency. Why is it important to get your facts right? Why does a story have to be told? Maybe McPhee thought that this goes without saying, and it does, but only if the writing conveys that urgency.

[John of Canada · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nice conversational tone,and typical John McPhee excellence.

[Michael Nielsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

True stories about the telling of true stories, by a wonderful and perceptive storyteller!

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is three different things - a guide on writing from a master writer, a memoir of a career that has lasted more than six decades, and a look behind the scenes on how some of my favorite McPhee books and articles were researched and written. That last part was my favorite. I wish all my favorite authors would write this type of book.

As far as learning to be a better writer, the best part for me was the encouragement to start writing and then try to figure out what you are doing. “You can't make a fix unless you know what is broken.”

As always, McPhee is humble, insightful, and full of love for the people around him - co-workers, editors, subjects, and readers.

[JJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Found this really good, not like cringe writing advice. Super solid and practical for essays. I feel like you can read this without aspirations to write and admire it as its own book.

[Zachary Coury · Rating 4 out of 5]

a lil all over the place but some fun stories and valuable lessons.
John McPhee is my Chappell Roan

[Marne - Reader By the Water · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lordy. I bit off more than I could chew with this one. I'm barely smart enough to "get" 80% of the CARTOONS in the New Yorker. This book had me on the struggle bus. And yet, I kept reading. There were gems in there that even I could pick up.

"Writers come in two principal categories - those who are overtly insecure and those who are covertly insecure - and they can all use help." (re: Editors)

"You are writing, say, about a grizzly bear. No words are forthcoming. ...You are blocked, frustrated, in despair...What do you do? You write, 'Dear Mother.' And then you tell your mother about the block, the frustration, the ineptitude, the despair...you whine, you whimper. You outline your problem, and you mention that the bear has a fifty-five-inch waist and a neck more than thirty inches around but could run nose-to-nose with Secretariat. You say the bear prefers to lie down and rest...And you go on like that for as long as you can. And then you go back and delete the 'Dear Mother' and all the whimpering and whining, and just keep the bear." (re: Writers Block)

His technique for drafts was illuminating. In the first draft, he just throws mud at the wall and then lets it come together in his subconscious. The second draft he reads aloud. After reading a third time, he "enclose(s) words and phrases in penciled boxes for Draft No. 4" Then he looks for replacements for the words in the boxes.

Speaking of words, there were so many I had to look up. Apocrypha. Horripilation. Diaeresis. Phalanxed. And those were just the ones I flagged because I couldn't figure them out in context.

Bottom line? It felt like a PhD class in Non-Fiction and I was only prepared for a Bachelors' class. Lol. But even I picked up some good stuff.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant! I use that word not in the breathlessly overdone North American synonym-for-quite-good way, but to convey what is offered up in every section of this book: John McPhee's brilliance. Yes, this is in its way about his writing processes but you're doing both the book and yourself a disservice if you conceive of it as only that. In fact, part of me doesn't want to persuade you to read it because I'm jealous and want to hoard all the little bits of life and knowledge shared herein.

[Angela · Rating 3 out of 5]

Complex yet straightforward, and intimidating yet encouraging. McPhee thematically conquers what we all as writers hope to accomplish, and that is to do the damn thing. An overall fun read that makes you want to write if you are truly a writer, but run for the hills if you are also truly a writer with some major work cut out for yourself.

[Christopher Porzenheim · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was expecting a book on writing more in the vein of the Elements of Style. What I got was more of an autobiography filled with humblebragging about an undeniably storied and successful career as a writer. I stopped reading because the ratio of self-laudatory anecdotes relative to truth claims about ways to write better became too frustrating.

[Mary Paul · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe it’s just the lack of context but my god I found this dry as dirt and half as appetizing.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

In two parts: (one) endorsement of the book in general (with reservations), (two) much, much too much thought (if that’s the word for it) and research inspired by McPhee’s use of the word “multiguously”

one – This is a collection of articles about the art and craft of writing, especially about writing long-form non-fiction. They originally appeared in The New Yorker between the years 2009 and 2014, according to another review here at Goodreads. I enjoyed reading them because I have read a lot of McPhee’s books, including (but not limited to) books about the Swiss Army, the New Jersey pine barrens, Alaska, geology, and oranges. I enjoyed them when I read them, and enjoyed being reminded of their contents. However, if you haven’t read them, the book may be less fun to read.

I imagine that some of the people picking up this book might think that they can get tips on how to be a good writer, and maybe they can. However, I don’t think that the normal aspiring writer will get a lot out of this book except the joy of seeing a great craftsman at work. McPhee's tips on writing will not be of much use to people who don’t already have as much talent as McPhee does. McPhee is like the master magician telling you how to do magic. If you don’t already have considerable talent, you will not be able to do as he does, but you can get joy out of appreciating how he does it.

All of the essays are pleasantly unserious, and some are actually funny, especially the essay about fact-checking.

two – The word “multiguously” appears on page 145 of this book in the following sentence:

I said the Hesperus had been “wrecked multiguously by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.”

I had never seen this word before, and did not understand its meaning, so I did what passes for normal behavior today, that is, I typed it into the Google search engine. To my surprise, no definition resulted. Google thought that I had mistyped – did I mean “multijugous”, “multivious” or “multifarious”? When I specified (must! contain! “multiguously”!), the only remaining links were to the Google Books page for this book and for a generally positive online review here which gave the use of this word as an example of McPhee’s occasional bouts of “dictionary disease”.

You don’t have to be a genius to figure, well, if there’s no “multiguously”, there might be a “multiguous”, which would at least give me some idea what the word was supposed to mean, because I still, at that point, had no clue. Google search again assumed I mistyped (“including results for multitudinous”), but eventually I convinced it otherwise (“search only for multiguously”!). The earliest of the handful of documents that had used this word was from 1912. After going this and other documents on this page, I finally figured it out: “multiguous” (and related words) was created by a few overeducated people as an analog to “ambiguous”, but necessary because (claim the overeducated) “ambi-” is a prefix which means two. So, “ambiguous” should only be used when two interpretations are possible. Otherwise, for more than two interpretations, “multiguous”.

So, again by analogy from “ambiguous”, the correct pronunciation must be “mul TIG u ous”, not (as I had thought) “MUL ti gu ous”.

I guess the people, separated in time and space, who made up this word thought it was necessary, but I don’t think this word is necessary.

There are two reasons that it is not necessary.

one – Even if we accept that “ambi-” is from a prefix occurring in Latin and meaning “two” (which I’m willing to quibble about, see below), there’s the argument that actual present usage is more relevant.

My thesis: In modern English, the definition of this word that most people today are carrying around in their heads is that “ambiguous” means “more than one meaning”. Most people would not, if they stopped to think about it, say “I can’t use ‘ambiguous’ here because there are three possible meanings.”

Sadly, I don’t believe there are any reliable polls of large segments of the population on this matter. I base my opinion on the observation that many modern dictionaries, who present themselves as authoritative on the matter of usage, seem not to limit this word’s meaning to only two interpretations. Witness The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. (1989), Volume I, page 386: “Admitting more than one interpretation, or of several possible meanings. (The commonest use.)” Another dictionary agrees: “open to more than one interpretation” (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th ed. (2011)). However, there is also “[a]ctual or potential uncertainty of meaning, especially if a word, phrase, or sentence can be understood in two ways” (The Oxford Companion to the English Language (1992), p. 33), so there’s some wiggle room for sticklers.

Two – Maybe “ambi-” = two is a false etymology, so insisting on the “two and two only” meaning is doubly wrong. Again, The Oxford English Dictionary (online, accessed June 9, 2023) gives the following etymology: “classical Latin ambiguus undecided, doubtful, wavering, … having more than one possible meaning, untrustworthy, unreliable”. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (2002), p 66: “L[atin] ambiguus, fr. ambigere to wander about, waver, dispute …”. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1975), p. 41): “Latin ambiguus, uncertain, going about, from ambigere, to wander about.

There’s enough evidence here that, if you could travel back in time and take a poll of toga-clad worthies, they would not agree that “ambi-” must mean two and never more than two.

I wasted a lot of time enjoyably, both with my home reference books and those of a library, thinking about and researching the above. I also tested the patience of several reference librarians, but I came away knowing how to access the Oxford English Dictionary for free from my home, using my library card. This knowledge, by itself, gave me joy.

But I digress. I discovered, while thinking about this issue, that I can be unfair to my fellow man (women too), as I felt that John McPhee, who has entertained me with many delightful books, could use “multiguously” and be a fine fellow, because stretching the language in this manner showed a kind of joy and exuberance in vigorous of the mot juste. On the other hand, when I examined the forgotten theses and papers which employed the word “multiguous” in 1912 and thereafter, I felt that the authors who, through no fault of their own, had not given me a moment’s pleasure, were probably a bunch of dried-out pedants who just wanted to look smarter than their associates by use of obscure language. Note to self: be more charitable to one’s fellow humans.

All of the above is a little silly, I know, because we have thousands and thousands of words with identical or overlapping meanings and nobody, as far as I know, makes a big magilla about, for example, “happy” and “glad”.

In conclusion, I wish to all who desire to deploy “multiguously” in discourse all the health and happiness that life allows.

However, I may write to the Oxford English Dictionary and tell them that “multiguously” and associated words (surely, it can’t be long before “multiguity” and “multiguousness” are on the lips of the overeducated) must be added to their database at the earliest possible opportunity.