Hey, internet! I'm planning my first piece of longform academic writing; any advice, considering i've previously written classwork essays under 3000 words?
Part of the reason I'm a little tripped up is because I decided I wanted the finished product to be widely accessible, because it's the sort of thing I'd have been very interested in about four years ago. (I'm very interested in it now!) While I know I can write plainly and simply with a bit of effort, I'm not sure how to make sure that I'm doing that and not writing . . . boringly? And, frankly, I've no idea how to check that the result Is accessible.
@percy One of the interesting events took place among the Greeks -- when mathematicians started proving obvious theorems.
@percy Firstly, consider your audience. How you write will ultimately be determined by single factor. Are you writing for a professor? For your classroom peers? In an academic journal? For all academics or only in your discipline?
@percy Make an outline to break the project into a series of subprojects of manageable size. Don't worry if your writing deviates from the outline; just adjust the outline as necessary.
And finally, you will have to revise several times over. If you can get someone knowledgeable to read it and point out where it's obscure, that's golden.
If you can find a word-processor that's compatible with software-style revision control, that can be good too.