HOW TO WRITE GOOD<\/p>\n
by Frank L. Visco<\/p>\n
My several years in the word game have learnt me several rules:<\/p>\n
1. Avoid alliteration. Always.<\/p>\n
2. Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.<\/p>\n
3. Avoid cliches like the plague. (They’re old hat.)<\/p>\n
4. Employ the vernacular.<\/p>\n
5. Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.<\/p>\n
6. Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.<\/p>\n
7. It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.<\/p>\n
8. Contractions aren’t necessary.<\/p>\n
9. Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.<\/p>\n
10. One should never generalize.<\/p>\n
11. Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said:
\n “I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.”<\/p>\n
12. Comparisons are as bad as cliches.<\/p>\n
13. Don’t be redundant; don’t more use words than necessary;
\n it’s highly superfluous.<\/p>\n
14. Profanity sucks.<\/p>\n
15. Be more or less specific.<\/p>\n
16. Understatement is always best.<\/p>\n
17. Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.<\/p>\n
18. One-word sentences? Eliminate.<\/p>\n
19. Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.<\/p>\n
20. The passive voice is to be avoided.<\/p>\n
21. Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.<\/p>\n
22. Even if a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.<\/p>\n
23. Who needs rhetorical questions?<\/p>\n
——–<\/p>\n
Frank L. Visco is a vice-president and senior copywriter at USAdvertising.<\/p>\n
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