William Zinsser Writing Quotes & Sayings

Finding a voice that your readers will enjoy is largely a matter of taste. Saying that isn't much help-taste is a quality so intangible that it can't even be defined. But we know it when we meet it. — William Zinsser

Don't try to guess what sort of thing editors want to publish or what you think the country is in a mood to read. Editors and readers don't know what they want to read until they read it. Besides, they're always looking for something new. — William Zinsser

The writer, his eye on the finish line, never gave enough thought to how to run the race. — William Zinsser

Writers and learners will write better and learn more if they understand the "why" of what they are studying. — William Zinsser

A simple [writing] style is the result of very hard work. — William Zinsser

One of underestimated tasks in nonfiction writing is to impose narrative shape on an unwieldy mass of material. — William Zinsser

Don't fight such a current if it feels right. Trust your material if it's taking you into terrain you didn't intend to enter but where the vibrations are good. Adjust your style accordingly and proceed to whatever destination you reach. Don't become the prisoner of a preconceived plan. Writing is no respecter of blueprints. — William Zinsser

Writing is a craft not an art. — William Zinsser

Learn to enjoy this tidying process. I don't like to write; I like to have written. But I love to rewrite. I especially like to cut: to press the DELETE key and see an unnecessary word or phrase or sentence vanish into the electricity. I like to replace a humdrum word with one that has more precision or color. I like to strengthen the transition between one sentence and another. I like to rephrase a drab sentence to give it a more pleasing rhythm or a more graceful musical line. With every small refinement I feel that I'm coming nearer to where I would like to arrive, and when I finally get there I know it was the rewriting, not the writing, that wont the game. — William Zinsser

Writing, I reminded them, can't be taught or learned in a vacuum. We must say to students in every area of knowledge: "This is how other people have written about this subject. Read it; study it; think about it. You can do it too." In many subjects, students don't even know that a literature exists - that mathematics, for instance, consists of more than right and wrong answers, that physics consists of more than right or wrong lab reports. I — William Zinsser

Journalism is writing that first appears in any periodic journal. — William Zinsser

Writing is learned by imitation. I learned to write mainly by reading writers who were doing the kind of writing I wanted to do and by trying to figure out how they did it. S. J. Perelman told me that when he was starting out he could have been arrested for imitating Ring Lardner. Woody Allen could have been arrested for imitating S. J. Perelman. And who hasn't tried to imitate Woody Allen? Students often feel guilty about modeling their writing on someone else's writing. They think it's unethical - which is commendable. Or they're afraid they'll lose their own identity. The point, however, is that we eventually move beyond our models; we take what we need and then we shed those skins and become who we are supposed to become. But — William Zinsser

You can solve most of your writing problems if you stop after every sentence and ask: what does the reader need to know next? — William Zinsser

Don't hedge your prose with little timidities. Good writing is lean and confident ... Every little qualifier whittles away some fraction of the reader's trust. Readers want a writer who believes in himself and in what he is saying. Don't diminish that belief. Don't be kind of bold. Be bold. — William Zinsser

I'm often dismayed by the sludge I see appearing on my screen if I approach writing as a task--the day's work--and not with some enjoyment. — William Zinsser

Go to your desk on Monday morning and write about some event that's still vivid in your memory. It doesn't have to be long - three pages, five pages - but it should have a beginning and an end. Put that episode in a folder and get on with your life. On Tuesday morning, do the same thing. Tuesday's episode doesn't have to be related to Monday's episode. Take whatever memory comes calling; your subconscious mind, having been put to work, will start delivering your past. Keep this up for two months, or three months, or six months. Don't be impatient to start writing your "memoir" - the one you had in mind before you began. Then, one day, take all your entries out of their folder and spread them on the floor. (The floor is often a writer's best friend.) Read them through and see what they tell you and what patterns emerge. They will tell you what your memoir is about - and what it's not about. — William Zinsser

Writing improves in direct ratio to the things we can keep out of it that shouldn't be there. — William Zinsser

But on the question of who you're writing for, don't be eager to please. — William Zinsser

Nobody told all the new computer writers that the essence of writing is rewriting. Just because they're writing fluently doesn't mean they're writing well. — William Zinsser

The best advice on writing I've ever received was from William Zinsser: 'Be grateful for every word you can cut.' — Christopher Buckley

There are some writers who sweep us along so strongly in their current of energy--Normal mailer, Tom Wolfe, Toni Morrison, William F. Buckley, Jr., Hunter Thompson, David Foster Wallace, Dave Eggers--that we assume that when they go to work the words just flow. Nobody thinks of the effort they made every morning to turn on the switch. You also have to turn on the switch. Nobody is going to do it for you. — William Zinsser

I don't read a lot of inspirational books for life. But for writing, I think the two best books are The War of Art and William Zinsser's On Writing Well. I read a lot of classics; — Donald Miller

Whenever I listen to an artist or an art historian I'm struck by how much they see and how much they know--and how much I don't.

Good art writing should therefore do at least two things. It should teach us how to look: at art, architecture, sculpture, photography and all the other visual components of our daily landscape. And it should give us the information we need to understand what we're looking at. — William Zinsser

Beware, then, of the long word that's no better than the short word: "assistance" (help), "numerous" (many), "facilitate" (ease), "Individual" (man or woman), "remainder" (rest), "initial" (first), "implement" (do), "sufficient" (enough), "attempt" (try), "referred to as" (called), and hundreds more. Beware of all the slippery new fad words: paradigm and parameter, prioritize and potentialize. They are all weeds that will smother what you write. Don't dialogue with someone you can talk to. Don't interface with anybody. — William Zinsser

Writing is learned by imitation. If anyone asked me how I learned to write, I'd say I learned by reading the men and women who were doing the kind of writing I wanted to do and trying to figure out how they did it. — William Zinsser

The only way to learn to write is to force yourself to produce a certain number of words on a regular basis. — William Zinsser

Keep your paragraphs short. Writing is visual - it catches the eye before it has a chance to catch the brain. — William Zinsser

Never say anything in writing that you wouldn't comfortably say in conversation. Be yourself when you write. If you're not a person who says 'indeed' or 'moreover,' or who calls someone an individual ('he's a fine individual'), please don't write it. — William Zinsser

Writing is not a special language that belongs to a few sensitive souls who have a 'gift for words'. Writing is the logical arrangement of thought. Anyone who thinks clearly should be able to write clearly
about any subject at all. — William Zinsser

Hard writing makes easy reading. Easy writing makes hard reading. — William Zinsser

Nobody ever stopped reading E. B. White or V. S. Pritchett because the writing was too good. — William Zinsser

The reader is someone with an attention span of about 30 seconds. — William Zinsser

Mind in language are inseparable. If we violate our language we violate ourselves. — William Zinsser

Vulnerability has a strength of its own. — William Zinsser

Writing wasn't easy and wasn't fun. It was hard and lonely, and the words seldom just flowed. — William Zinsser

Good writers are visible just behind their words. — William Zinsser

Every time you look at a blank piece of paper, you're doing something new. You have to step onto that blank territory and remind yourself the sky didn't fall in the last time you wrote. Writing is a question of overcoming your fears-and everybody has them. — William Zinsser

Writing is such lonely work that I try to keep myself cheered up. If something strikes me as funny in the act of writing, I throw it in just to amuse myself. If I think it's funny I assume a few other people will find it funny, and that seems to me to be a good day's work. — William Zinsser

Good writing is good writing, whatever form it takes and whatever we call it. — William Zinsser

Most nonfiction writers have a definitiveness complex. They feel that they are under some obligation - to the subject, to their honor, to the gods of writing - to make their article the last word. It's a commendable impulse, but there is no last word. — William Zinsser

You learn to write by writing. — William Zinsser

Many of us were taught that no sentence should begin with "but." If that's what you learned, unlearn it - there's no stronger word at the start. It announces a total contrast with what has gone before, and the reader is thereby primed for the change. — William Zinsser

Not everybody has a talent for painting, or for the piano, or for dance. But we can write our way into the artist's head and into his problems and solutions. Or we can go there with another writer. — William Zinsser

I took William Zinsser's advice that you write to yourself and you hope that there are people out there who are like you. — Donald Miller

Good writing has an aliveness that keeps the reader reading from one paragraph to the next, and it's not a question of gimmicks to "personalize" the author. — William Zinsser

Many writers are paralyzed by the thought that they are competing with everybody else who is trying to write and presumably doing it better ... Forget the competition and go at your own pace. Your only contest is with yourself. — William Zinsser

A writer will do anything to avoid the act of writing. — William Zinsser

Writing is the handmaiden of leadership. — William Zinsser

Writing is hard work. A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first time, or even the third time. Remember this in moments of despair. If you find that writing is hard, it's because it is hard. It's one of the hardest things that people do — William Zinsser

If writing seems hard, it's because it is hard. It's one of the hardest things people do. — William Zinsser

Ultimately the product that any writer has to sell is not the subject being written about, but who he or she is. — William Zinsser

A clear sentence is no accident. — William Zinsser

Writing and learning and thinking are the same process. — William Zinsser

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. — William Zinsser

Writers can write to affirm and to celebrate, or they can write to debunk and destroy; the choice is ours. — William Zinsser

Four basic premises of writing: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity. — William Zinsser

Much of my writing has taken the form of a pilgrimage: to sacred places that represent the best of America, to musicians and other artists who represent the best of their art. — William Zinsser

Writing can be taught or learned in the vacuum. We must say to students in every area of knowledge: "This is a how other people have written about this subject. Read it; study it; think about it. You can do it too. — William Zinsser

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. — William Zinsser

It's a memoir of various events in my own life, but it's also a teaching book: along the way I explain the writing decisions I made. They are the same decisions that confront every writer going in search of his or her past: matters of selection, reduction, organization and tone. — William Zinsser

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING Judith Barrington, Writing the Memoir: From Truth to Art; Annie Dillard and Cort Conley, eds., Modern American Memoirs; Patricia Hampl, I Could Tell You Stories: Sojourns in the Land of Memory; Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life; Phillip Lopate, ed., The Art of the Personal Essay; Jane Taylor McDonnell, Living to Tell the Tale: A Guide to Writing Memoir; and William Zinsser, ed., Inventing the Truth: The Art and Craft of Memoir. — Vivian Gornick

Every writing project must be reduced before you start to write. — William Zinsser

If you write for yourself, you'll reach all the people you want to write for. — William Zinsser

We write to find out what we know and what we want to say. — William Zinsser

Writing is thinking on paper. Anyone who thinks clearly can write clearly, about anything at all. — William Zinsser

Editors are licensed to be curious. — William Zinsser

To defend what you've written is a sign that you are alive. — William Zinsser

Soon after you confront the matter of preserving your identity, another question will occur to you: "Who am I writing for?" It's a fundamental question, and it has a fundamental answer: You are writing for yourself. Don't try to visualize the great mass audience. There is no such audience - every reader is a different person. Don't try to guess what sort of thing editors want to publish or what you think the country is in a mood to read. Editors and readers don't know what they want to read until they read it. Besides, they're always looking for something new. Don't worry about whether the reader will "get it" if you indulge a sudden impulse for humor. If it amuses you in the act of writing, put it in. (It can always be taken out, but only you can put it in.) You are writing primarily to please yourself, and if you go about it with enjoyment you will also entertain the readers who are worth writing for. If you lose the dullards back in the dust, you don't want them anyway. This — William Zinsser

Don't annoy your readers by over-explaining--by telling them something they already know or can figure out. Try not to use words like "surprisingly," "predictably" and "of course," which put a value on a fact before the reader encounters the fact. Trust your material. — William Zinsser

It wont do to say that the reader is too dumb or too lazy to keep pace with the train of thought. If the reader is lost, it's usually because the writer hasn't be careful enough. — William Zinsser

I almost always urge people to write in the first person ... Writing is an act of ego and you might as well admit it. — William Zinsser

Be yourself and your readers will follow you anywhere. Try to commit an act of writing and they will jump overboard to get away. — William Zinsser

Good writing is lean and confident. — William Zinsser

But apart from these lazinesses of logic, what makes the story so tired is the failure of the writer to reach for anything but the nearest cliche'. "Shouldered his way," "only to be met," "crashing into his face," "waging a lonely war," "corruption that is rife," "sending shock waves," "New York's finest," - these dreary phrases constitute writing at its most banal. We know just what to expect. No surprise awaits us in the form of an unusual word, an oblique look. We are in the hands of a hack, and we know it right away, We stop reading. — William Zinsser

Write about small, self-contained incidents that are still vivid in your memory. If you remember them, it's because they contain a larger truth that your readers will recognize in their own lives. Think small and you'll wind up finding the big themes in your family saga. — William Zinsser

All writing is ultimately a question of solving a problem. — William Zinsser

Look for the clutter in your writing and prune it ruthlessly. Be grateful for everything you can throw away. Reexamine each sentence you put on paper. Is every word doing new work? Can any thought be expressed with more economy? — William Zinsser

My four articles of faith: clarity, simplicity, brevity and humanity. — William Zinsser

Make a habit of reading what is being written today and what has been written before. Writing is learned by imitation. — William Zinsser

Believe in your own identity and your own opinions. Proceed with confidence, generating it, if necessary, by pure willpower. Writing is an act of ego and you might as well admit it. Use its energy to keep yourself going. — William Zinsser

Some people write by day, others by night. Some people need silence, others turn on the radio. Some write by hand, some by typewriter or word processor, some by talking into a tape recorder. Some people write their first draft in one long burst and the revise; others can't write the second paragraph until they have fiddled endlessly with the first.

But all of them are vulnerable and all of them are tense. — William Zinsser

The secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components. Every word that serves no function, every long word that could be a short word, every adverb that carries the same meaning that's already in the verb, every passive construction that leaves the reader unsure of who is doing what - these are the thousand and one adulterants that weaken the strength of a sentence. And they usually occur in proportion to the education and rank. — William Zinsser

Clutter is the disease of American writing. We are a society strangling in unnecessary words, circular constructions, pompous frills, and meaningless jargon. — William Zinsser

Don't say you were a bit confused and sort of tired and a little depressed and somewhat annoyed. Be tired. Be confused. Be depressed. Be annoyed. Don't hedge your prose with little timidities. Good writing is lean and confident. — William Zinsser

Unfortunately, an equally strong negative current - fear - is at work. Fear of writing gets planted in most Americans at an early age, usually at school, and it never entirely goes away. The blank piece of paper or the blank computer screen, waiting to be filled with our wonderful words, can freeze us into not writing any words at all, or writing words that are less than wonderful. — William Zinsser

There are many good reasons for writing that have nothing to do with being published. Writing is a powerful search mechanism, and one of its satisfactions is to come to terms with your life narrative. Another is to work through some of life's hardest knocks - loss, grief, illness, addiction, disappointment, failure - and to find understanding and solace. — William Zinsser

Rewriting is the essence of writing well - where the game is won or lost. — William Zinsser

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. — William Zinsser

The final advantage is the same that applies in every other competitive venture. If you would like to write better than everyone else, you have to want to write better than everyone 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 are not as high. Too many writers are browbeaten into settling for less than their best. — William Zinsser

writing is a sanity-saving companion for people in times of grief, loss, illness, and other accidents of fate. — William Zinsser

writing is a craft, not an art, and that the man who runs away from his craft because he lacks inspiration is fooling himself. — William Zinsser

A writer is always working. — William Zinsser

Few people realize how badly they write. Nobody has shown them how much excess or murkiness has crept into their style. — William Zinsser

Truth needs no adornment. — William Zinsser

There are all kinds of writers and all kinds of methods, and any method that helps you to say what you want to say is the right method for you. — William Zinsser

Get people talking. Learn to ask questions that will elicit answers about what is most interesting or vivid in their lives. Nothing so animates writing as someone telling what he thinks or what he does - in his own words. His own words will always be better than your words, even if you are the most elegant stylist in the land. — William Zinsser

What we found developing at Gustavus Adolphus was a sense that we should all be sharing the responsibility for teaching writing. We formed a writing committee that consisted of professors from many different disciplines, and we invited proposals for 'W' courses from the entire faculty. The response was instantaneous. As soon as the ownership of writing by the English department was lost, people in other fields said, 'I'd be willing to give it a try. — William Zinsser

You must find some way to elevate your act of writing into an entertainment. Usually this means giving the reader an enjoyable surprise. Any number of devices will do the job ... These seeming amusements in fact become your 'style.' When we say we like the style of certain writers, what we mean is that we like their personality as they express it on paper. — William Zinsser

Clear thinking becomes clear writing; one can't exist without the other. — William Zinsser

I have no interest in teaching writers how to sell. I want to teach them how to write. If the process is sound, the product will take care of itself, and sales are likely to follow. — William Zinsser