04 Dec 1996, The Daily Telegraph

If you want to win, ask an expert

As the Telegraph's 10th Young Science Writer Awards are launched, Steve Jones meets top essayist Stephen Jay Gould.

By Steve Jones

TODAY's greatest scientific essayist is Stephen Jay Gould. To discuss that art and hear his advice to those who want to enter the Young Science Writer Competition, launched today on this page, I met him in an unfamiliar milieu: at Claridge's hotel (where he was staying while promoting his new book, Life's Grandeur).

Neither of us, it has to be said, felt much at home. As for writing a piece set in surroundings of such lifeless self-aggrandisement, Gould said: "I couldn't do it: Trollope might, but he knew the culture. And knowing the culture is central to being a science writer. Science is a civilisation of its own.

As a result, only scientists can make a good job of presenting it. If you don't live in the community and don't understand its rules you are crippled from the start." In his view, science journalism in Britain is better than in his native United States - because it is mainly by trained scientists.

Wasn't he being unfair to his local science writers? "Not really; the New York Times covers the subject brilliantly, but it has science reporters, most of whom came from journalism. They are excellent at what they do; but they often miss the point. So my first piece of advice for an aspiring essayist is to be a scientist first."

Did journalists have anything to say about science writing? "Of course. They know the basic rules. Use the active voice, not the passive (I found, not it was found). Label your metaphors. They are devices, not discoveries."

Take James Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis, for example. It suggests that life and the planet act together to form a single self-regulating planetary superorganism. "Well, an earth goddess is a nice idea: but don't forget that all that stuff about the earth controlling its climate fits solidly into physics, and doesn't need a deity. She may be a beautiful image but take her seriously and you sink into a metaphorical morass."

One of Gould's axioms is: never write down to the reader. "Make no concessions," he says. "You can simplify the language but must never adulterate it. Above all, you cannot simplify the argument. Once a reader notices that he is being patronised, your piece is dead.

I certainly don't think of myself as a populariser of science. Instead, I write science for those who are willing to make the effort to understand it." For Gould, it's important to get the level right, to aim as high as he thinks his audience can manage. He is proud to point out that his essays are used in schools, "but only in what in Britain you would call the sixth form - and they are pretty challenging even for a keen sixth-former. "That's what I aim at: it may not be a universal rule, but it works for me".

Another crucial point is to choose the right subject. "My writings have been successful. Partly it's me, but mainly it's what I write about. What else is there like evolution? It appeals to the heart as much as the mind - and approaches the basic issues about where we came from and how we got to be what we are that everyone wants to understand." Evolution may not be able to solve all those questions but at least it asks them in a new way. "I thank my lucky stars that I was not born a polymer chemist," said Gould. "I'm sure that I would have run out of literary steam long before now."

One of the beauties of the subject is that evolution has roots in the past - in a literal sense, of course; but also because so many of those who studied it were extraordinary people. That's a hint for anyone who wants to write but can't find a place to start - go in through the door marked history.

It is also important not to be defensive about what you are doing. Take Gould's own literary history: "My views have changed since I began. Once, I wondered why scientists bothered and I held popular science writing almost in contempt. Now, I feel that it is a genuinely noble cause and not just a diluted version of doing research."

He reminded me that the divorce of scientific literature from that meant for the public is new. Afer all, The Origin of Species - the most important book in biology - can still be enjoyed by someone who knows no biology at all.

When it comes to his own literary influences, Gould was diplomatic. "It would be invidious to choose a living writer as a model, but my two favourites of the 20th century are both Brits - Peter Medawar and J. B. S. Haldane. If I could write half as well as either of them I would be a happy man. Anyone hoping to write a good scientific essay should look there first."

And what about his own writings? "Try my most recent collection, Dinosaur in a Haystack, which succeeds as well as I am able in what I set out to do. I am particularly proud of one piece ("Hooking Leviathan by Its Past"). "It illustrates a good reason for writing popular science - to fire a few shots in the war against irrationalism, in this case against the creationists who argue that there are no transitional stages between land mammals and whales.

The absurd has always been with us, and although it is not much worse than it ever has been, it pays to be always on guard." Gould traces his passion for science writing back 20 years, when he was working on the Irish elk. This involved measuring skulls in all kinds of unlikely places.

"While writing up the results I noticed what a mass of odd stories surrounded even a fairly conventional piece of research. I suddenly realised that all science has a social context." That was his key moment.

"The door swung open. I wrote a piece on the Meaning of Elks in Natural History magazine; they asked me to write a monthly column and, now, 260 essays on, here we are. In some ways, the hardest thing was to get started: I found that I loved writing, and everything since then has been, more or less, a pleasure."

And, on that note, we left Claridge's for our own culture.

Life's Grandeur: The Spread of Excellence from Plato to Darwin, Stephen Jay Gould, Jonathan Cape.