William Zinsser
William Zinsser
William Knowlton Zinsserwas an American writer, editor, literary critic, and teacher. He began his career as a journalist for the New York Herald Tribune, where he worked as a feature writer, drama editor, film critic and editorial writer. He was a longtime contributor to leading magazines...
running determination character
Tips can make someone a better writer but not necessarily a good writer. That's a larger package - a matter of character. Golfing is more than keeping the left arm straight. Every good golfer is a complex engine that runs on ability, ego, determination, discipline, patience, confidence, and other qualities that are self-taught. So it is with writers and all creative artists. If their values are solid their work is likely to be solid.
writing doe needs
You can solve most of your writing problems if you stop after every sentence and ask: what does the reader need to know next?
writing pride sight
If you would like to write better than everybody else, you have to want to write better than everybody else. You must take an obsessive pride in the smallest details of your craft. And you must be willing to defend what you've written against the various middlemen - editors, agents and publishers - whose sights may be different from yours, whose standards not so high.
mistake corporations language
Clutter is the official language used by corporations to hide their mistakes.
art writing editors
To write a good memoir you must become the editor of your own life, imposing on an untidy sprawl of half-remembered events a narrative shape and an organizing idea. Memoir is the art of inventing the truth.
jobs satisfaction arriving
The writers job is like solving a puzzle, and finally arriving at a solution is a tremendous satisfaction.
care who-cares usage
The writer who cares about usage must always know the quick from the dead.
spring training sound
The sound of the bat is the music of spring training.
writing men want
The best way to learn to write is to study the work of the men and women who are doing the kind of writing you want to do.
men relax hernias
Telling a writer to relax is like telling a man to relax while being prodded for a possible hernia.
people want pillars
People and places are the twin pillars on which most nonfiction is built. Every human event happens somewhere, and the reader wants to know what that somewhere was like.
want facts exit
When you're ready to stop, stop. If you have presented all the facts and made the point you want to make, look for the nearest exit.
memories records custodians
Writers are the custodians of memory, and that's what this chapter is about: how to leave some kind of record of your life and of the family you were born into.
mean writing essence
Nobody told all the new e-mail writers that the essence of writing is rewriting. Just because they are writing with ease and enjoyment doesn't mean they are writing well.