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Eloquence invites us to bring some part of ourselves to the transaction.

William Zinsser

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William Zinsser
Age: 92 †
Born: 1922
Born: October 7
Died: 2015
Died: May 12
Journalist
Literary Critic
Writer
New York City
New York
William Knowlton Zinsser
Part
Transaction
Transactions
Eloquence
Invites
Bring

More quotes by William Zinsser

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You learn to write by writing.
William Zinsser
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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
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There's no sentence that's too short in the eyes of God.
William Zinsser
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All writing is ultimately a question of solving a problem.
William Zinsser
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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
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Scholarship hath no fury like that of a language purist faced with sludge.
William Zinsser
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Every successful piece of nonfiction should leave the reader with one provocative thought that he or she didn't have before. Not two thoughts, or five - just one. So decide what single point you want to leave in the reader's mind.
William Zinsser
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A simple [writing] style is the result of very hard work.
William Zinsser
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Dare to tell the smallest of stories if you want to generate large emotions.
William Zinsser
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Be grateful for every word you can cut.
William Zinsser
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Clear thinking becomes clear writing one can't exist without the other.
William Zinsser
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Clutter is the disease of American writing. We are a society strangling in unnecessary words, circular constructions, pompous frills, and meaningless jargon.
William Zinsser
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Memoir is the art of inventing the truth.
William Zinsser
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Writing and learning and thinking are the same process.
William Zinsser
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Editors are licensed to be curious.
William Zinsser
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Writing is thinking on paper.
William Zinsser
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All writers should strive to deliver something fresh-something editors or readers won't know they want until they see it.
William Zinsser
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Writing is a craft not an art.
William Zinsser
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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
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The most important sentence in any article is the first one. If it doesn't induce the reader to proceed to the second sentence, your article is dead. And if the second sentence doesn't induce him to continue to the third sentence, it's equally dead.
William Zinsser