Betray Quote by Edward Abbey

At the beginning of their careers many writers have a need to overwrite. They choose carefully turned-out phrases; they want to impress their readers…

— Jorge Luis Borges

Felicity, not fluency of language, is a merit.

— Edwin Percy Whipple

“The ordinary writer has an unmistakable preference for this style, because it causes the reader to spend time and trouble in understanding that which…

— Arthur Schopenhaur

The more stringent the rules and the more limiting they are, the more the poet and writer is forced to resort to special techniques…

— Simin Behbahani

“The realistic style is easy to abuse: from haste, from lack of awareness, from inability to bridge the chasm that lies between what a…

— Raymond Chandler

A fluent writer always seems more talented than he is. To write well, one needs a natural felicity and an acquired difficulty.

— Joseph Joubert

Good style happens in one of two ways: the writer either has an inborn talent or is willing to work herself to death to…

— Haruki Murakami

“As social concerns override literary ones, writers seem fated to eschew virtuosity and experimentation in favor of a bland but immediately accessible style. Writing…

— Nicholas Carr

“It is precisely in that relationship to the Reader that you will find most of the classic faults of style: pretension, condescension, servility, obscurantism,…

— Stephen Koch

There is no satisfactory explanation of style, no infallible guide to good writing, no assurance that a person who thinks clearly will be able…

— E. B. White

“Every stylistic excess and moral defect which critics conspired to ignore in the author's first books, LANARK and UNLIKELY STORIES, MOSTLY, is to be…

— Alasdair Gray

“A profound theme is of trifling importance if the characters knocked around by it are uninteresting, and brilliant technique is a nuisance if it…

— John Gardner