# Writing rules

Follow these rules when writing or editing prose. Apply them sentence by sentence.

## Sentences

- Know what each sentence says, what it does not say, and what it implies.
- Let each sentence say its one thing, then end it.
- Write short sentences until you can feel the difference a long one makes.
- Build a long sentence only from strong short ones, and keep it as clear as a short one.
- Make every sentence a complete thought that stands on its own feet.
- Never let a sentence talk about what it is saying.
- Reject the sentence that offers itself up ready-made.
- Know the whole sentence before you write it down.
- When a sentence goes wrong, ask what you are trying to say and write the answer.
- Pursue clarity, not a style or a voice.

## Words

- Use the real name of a thing, not the category it belongs to.
- Never use a long word where a short one will do.
- Turn -ion nouns and noun phrases back into verbs.
- Cut intensifiers and adverbs the verb already contains.
- Use the fewest words that say it, and do not make explicit what is already implied.
- Look up the words you feel sure of, not only the ones you doubt.
- Do not dodge "is" with a fancier verb that means the same thing.
- Prefer everyday words to jargon, foreign phrases and scientific borrowings.
- When prose stiffens, use contractions and shorter words.
- Use metaphors rarely, briefly, and only when they are literally accurate.

## Verbs & syntax

- Make the subject an actor capable of doing what the verb says.
- Keep people in the sentence; do not let abstractions replace them.
- Keep the subject close to its verb.
- Use the active voice; never use the passive to hide who acted.
- Use one plain verb instead of a weak verb plus a noun.
- Replace phrase-prepositions with plain ones.
- Cut "There is" and "It is" openings and start with the real subject.
- Do not bolt clauses on with "with" or "as".
- Replace inert verbs with verbs that show an action.
- Put every word and phrase next to what it modifies.
- Give transitive verbs their objects.
- Use the simple past; do not stack pasts on pasts.
- Say the plain positive instead of denying a negative.
- Do not coin -ize, de- and -ization words to avoid a plain phrase.
- Do not dress a list up as a range with "from ... to".

## Dead language

- Never use a figure of speech you are used to seeing in print.
- Cut any phrase whose words cluster together on their own.
- Choose words for their meaning; do not glue together ready-made strips.
- Do not prop up the end of a sentence with a grand commonplace.
- Do not use words the reader cannot check against anything.
- Name ugly things plainly.
- Do not dress up a judgment in scientific or heroic vocabulary.
- Keep concrete images; do not translate them into abstractions.
- Cut the connective words that simulate logic.

## The reader

- Write for a reader who is intelligent and reads every word literally.
- Leave room for the reader to complete the thought.
- Show the thing, then stop; do not tell the reader what it means.
- Never write a sentence whose only job is to connect two others.
- Do not restate the previous sentence before adding to it.
- State what you see; cut the hedges and apologies.
- Do not imitate the voice of professors, journalists or experts.
- Do not wink at the reader or write for applause.
- Say the obvious thing plainly; it may be news to the reader.
- Make every sentence deliver what its opening promises.
- Use "I" when it belongs; do not contort sentences to avoid it.

## Openings, order, endings

- Start the piece with its first real sentence; skip the throat-clearing.
- Do not write a hook; the reader does not need grabbing.
- Do not make the first sentence summarize or frame the whole piece.
- Find the structure sentence by sentence instead of filling in an outline.
- Do not save the best point for the end.
- Cut topic sentences and paragraphs that announce what is coming.
- Stop when you are done; do not add a summarizing finale.
- Do not default to telling things in the order they happened.
- Use the one detail or quote you need, where you need it.
- Persuade with clear sentences, not with the scaffolding of an argument.
- Know why you are telling the reader this before you write it.

## Rhythm

- Hunt for sameness in sentence length and structure, and break it.
- Do not let a pattern dictate the next sentence.
- Do not steer the reader with a contrast word at the start of a sentence.
- Remove "but" and "however" when the reversal survives without them.
- Put the words that matter at the start or the end of the sentence.
- Use a short sentence as a harbinger, a reprise or a coda.
- Keep the last sentence from settling into a steady, predictable beat.
- Adjust each sentence until you can imagine saying it.

## Revision

- Revise toward brevity: remove words instead of adding them.
- Look for the better sentence hiding inside a bad one.
- Fix a broken sentence by rethinking it, not by rearranging its words.
- Read your draft aloud and stop wherever your ear senses trouble.
- Put each sentence on its own line to see it.
- Revise at the point of composition; do not leave placeholders to fix later.
- Read your work as a reader would, not as its writer.
- Hunt down words you repeated by accident.
- Do not judge whole sections; fix one sentence at a time.
- Revise toward brevity, directness, simplicity, clarity, rhythm, literalness, implication, variation and silence.

## Noticing & thinking

- Use the sentences to find out what you think.
- Write down what you actually noticed, not what you are supposed to notice.
- Attest to what you saw instead of trying to prove a case.
- Write only what you actually think, not what the audience expects.
- Acknowledge what you do not know instead of hiding it.
- Distrust sentences that came easily; flow is something the reader feels, not the writer.
- Read for how sentences are made, not only for what they mean.