By Julie Daines
In 1986, Frank L. Visco published this advice in Writer's Digest. It's so awesome I had to post it again here, even though I'm sure many of you have already seen this.
How To Write Good:
My several years in the word game have learnt me several rules: | |
- Avoid Alliteration. Always.
- Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
- Avoid cliches like the plague. (They’re old hat.)
- Employ the vernacular.
- Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.
- Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.
- It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.
- Contractions aren’t necessary.
- Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.
- One should never generalize.
- Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.”
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- Comparisons are as bad as cliches.
- Don’t be redundant; don’t use more words than necessary; it’s highly superfluous.
- Profanity sucks.
- Be more or less specific.
- Understatement is always best.
- Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.
- One word sentences? Eliminate.
- Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.
- The passive voice is to be avoided.
- Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.
- Even if a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.
- Who needs rhetorical questions?
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Here are a few more added to the list by another guy:
- Never use a big word when a diminutive alternative would suffice.
- Poofread carefully to see if you any words out.
- A writer must not shift your point of view.
- If you reread your work, you can find on rereading a great deal of repetition can be by rereading and editing.
Click here for source.
Posted by Julie Daines
www.juliedaines.blogspot.com
4 comments:
Love it! Thanks for sharing!
Good reminders! Thanks, Julie!
Thanks for sharing! I love this! I'm going to use it in my English class. :)
So funny! I love it!
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