THE SUBSTRUCTURES WITHIN THE PYRAMID

As we explained, a clear piece of writing establishes a rigid set of relationships between its ideas, so that they will form a comprehensive pyramidal structure. It then presents the ideas to the reader, starting at the top and working down each leg.

Because of the specificity of the pyramid rules, if you know what your ideas are before you begin to write, you can relatively easily form them into a proper pyramid. Most people when they sit down to write, however, have only a hazy notion of their ideas (if that). Nor should they expect much more. You cannot know precisely what you think until you have been forced to symbolize it- either by saying it out loud or by writing it down - and even then the first statement of the idea is likely to be less precise than you can eventually make it.

Consequently, you cannot hope just to sit down and start arranging your ideas into a pyramid. You have to discover them first. But the pyramid dictates a set of substructures that can serve to speed the discovery process. These are:

- The vertical relationship between points and subpoints

- The horizontal relationship within a set of subpoints 

- The narrative flow of the introduction.

Let me explain the exact nature of these relationships and then, tell you how to use then to discover, sort, and arrange your ideas so that they will be clear, first to yourself and then to your reader.