All writers should strive to deliver something fresh-something editors or readers won't know they want until they see it. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Writers can write to affirm and to celebrate, or they can write to debunk and destroy; the choice is ours. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Clutter is the disease of American writing. We are a society strangling in unnecessary words, circular constructions, pompous frills, and meaningless jargon. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
“Writers and learners will write better and learn more if they understand the "why" of what they are studying.” — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Don’t try to visualize the great mass audience. There is no such audience—every reader is a different person. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Many writers are paralyzed by the thought that they are competing with everybody else who is trying to write and presumably doing… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Much of my writing has taken the form of a pilgrimage: to sacred places that represent the best of America, to musicians… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Don’t say you were a bit confused and sort of tired and a little depressed and somewhat annoyed. Be tired. Be confused.… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
I have no interest in teaching writers how to sell. I want to teach them how to write. If the process is… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Writers who think THEY are being criticized when only that writing is being criticized are beyond a teacher's reach. Writing can only… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Rewriting is the essence of writing well: it's where the game is won or lost. The idea is hard to accept. We… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Don't try to guess what sort of thing editors want to publish or what you think the country is in a mood… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
To write a good memoir you must become the editor of your own life, imposing on an untidy sprawl of half-remembered events… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
You'll never make your mark as a writer unless you develop a respect for words and a curiosity about their shades of… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Writing is such lonely work that I try to keep myself cheered up. If something strikes me as funny in the act… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Finding a voice that your readers will enjoy is largely a matter of taste. Saying that isn't much help-taste is a quality… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Writing is linear and sequential; Sentence B must follow Sentence A, and Sentence C must follow Sentence B, and eventually you get… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
“If a philosophical writer cannot be followed, the difficulty of his subject can be placed only in mitigation of his offense, not… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Never hesitate to imitate another writer - every person learning a craft or an art needs models. Eventually you'll find your own… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
“Writing can be taught or learned in the vacuum. We must say to students in every area of knowledge: "This is a… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Don't hedge your prose with little timidities. Good writing is lean and confident. . . . Every little qualifier whittles away some… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
A writer is obviously at his most natural and relaxed when he writes in the first person. Writing is a personal transaction… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Writing is learned by imitation. If anyone asked me how I learned to write, I'd say I learned by reading the men… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Many of us were taught that no sentence should begin with "but." If that's what you learned, unlearn it - there's no… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Readers must be given room to bring their own emotions to a piece so crammed with emotional content; the writer must tenaciously… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
“But the secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components. Every words that serves no function, every long word… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
No one has something original or important to say will willing we run the risk of being misunderstood; people who write obscurely are either… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Avoid the ecstatic adjectives that occupy such disproportionate space in every critic's quiver - words like "enthralling" and "luminous." — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Scholarship hath no fury like that of a language purist faced with sludge. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Clutter is the official language used by corporations to hide their mistakes. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Keep your paragraphs short. Writing is visual - it catches the eye before it has a chance to catch the brain. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Never hesitate to imitate another writer - every person learning a craft or an art needs models. Eventually you'll find your own voice and… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill rode to glory on the back of the strong declarative sentence. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Writing organizes and clarifies our thoughts. Writing is how we think our way into a subject and make it our own. Writing enables us… — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Rewriting is the essence of writing well - where the game is won or lost. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
Clear thinking becomes clear writing; one can't exist without the other. — William Zinsser Copy Share Image
