A concise primer from Strunk & White's guide titled 'The Elements of Style.'

1. Approaching Writing
A concise primer from Strunk &
White’s venerable – and entertaining
– guide titled ‘The Elements of Style.’

2. 1. Write simply.
Write in a way that is concise, informative,
unpretentious. This kind of straightforward
writing will never be out of fashion

3. 2. Write with nouns and verbs.
Write with nouns and verbs, not with adjectives
and adverbs. In general…it is nouns and verbs,
not their assistants, that give good writing its
toughness and color.

4. 3. Do not overwrite.
Rich, ornate prose is hard to digest, generally
unwholesome, and sometimes nauseating.
Ruthlessly, delete the excess.

5. 4. Avoid fancy words.
Avoid the elaborate, the pretentious, the coy, the
fancy and the cute. Avoid word like ‘beauteous,’
‘curvaceous,’ ‘prodigious,’ if simpler words will
do. Do not be tempted by a twenty-dollar word
when there is a ten-center handy, ready and
able.

6. 5. Use figures of speech sparingly.
• The simile is a common device and a useful
one, but similes coming in rapid fire, one right
on top of another, are more distracting than
illuminating.
• When you use a metaphor, do not mix it up.
That is, don’t start by calling something a
swordfish and end by calling it an hourglass!

7. 6. Sharpen your ear.
Read the following example:
“A claw hammer, not an ax, was the tool he murdered her
with.”
This is preferable to “A claw hammer, not an ax, was the
tool with which he murdered her.”
Why? The first sentence is actually grammatically less
correct than the second example. But it sounds more
violent, more like murder. You see, it is a matter of ear.

8. 7. Avoid the use of qualifiers.
Qualifying words like ‘rather,’ ‘very,’ ‘little,’
‘pretty,’ make writing weak – avoid them!

9. 8. Use orthodox spelling.
Do not write ‘nite’ for ‘night,’ ‘thru’ for ‘through,’
‘pleez’ for ‘please.’

10. 9. Revise and rewrite.
Revising is a part of writing. Even professional
writers rewrite numerous times.