In his new book, Them: Why We Hate Each Other—and How to Heal, Ben Sasse mentions as an aside some advice he received on writing his dissertation for Harry (“Skip”) Stout, who serves as the Jonathan Edwards Professor of American Religious History at Yale University:
Have a specific reader in mind.
Pretend that he or she is sitting next to your desk, and you’re reading aloud to an audience of one.
Pretend your audience is smarter than you are, but knows absolutely nothing about the topic.
Sasse comments:
I set up an 8×10 photo of one of my aunts from the farm—and I wrote my dissertation to her.