Where Do I Begin?

By Richard Carson, PhD, Senior Editor

Recently, we completed a project here at PSG that asked us to write a concise but comprehensive overview of World War II. The idea was that this document would provide as many relevant facts about the war as could fit on a very limited number of electronic pages.

Admittedly, when first presented with this task, I was somewhat intimidated by the magnitude of information that had to be assembled. My writer's block was broken in a rare moment of coincidence between one's personal and professional life when my elderly father, a veteran of the war, suffered some temporary delirium and thought he was a soldier defending the Philippines. He had, in fact, been a soldier in France in the last months of the war. But I knew that he had originally been assigned to the Philippines and only escaped that conflict because the troop ship that was to take him there had left California by the time his train arrived from Boston. As I pondered these events, I found myself asking questions: Had he known men who had gone and not returned? Had he known men who had returned and told him stories? He never talked about it much, but I decided to use this opportunity to learn what I could.

I began with the Battle of the Philippines but, as happens, article led to article, reference to reference, the Pacific War led me to the war in Europe, the rise of Fascism, the war at home. I assembled fact upon fact about battles, generals, leaders, conferences, and every other relevant bit of information I could find. When, finally, I had to start writing and organizing all of this, I kept asking myself, Where do I begin? The invasion of Poland? The Spanish Civil War? The invasion of Manchuria?

My experience with this assignment has made me reflect, not just about World War II, but about writers and editors whose job it is to fashion a product designed to transmit information concisely and efficiently. While so much of our work is interwoven with technology, always, it begins with people asking questions. What was this about? Who was involved? What did it mean? I made all those facts fit upon their required electronic pages. Happily, upon completion, I was left with yet another question: What next?