On Writing Well

Q1 Style Good writers are visible just behind their words. If you aren’t allowed to use “I,” at least think “I” while you write, or write the first draft in the first person and then take the “I”s out. It will warm up your impersonal style. Sell yourself, and your subject will exert its own appeal. Believe in your own identity and your own opinions. Writing is an act of ego, and you might as well admit it. Use its energy to keep yourself going.

P:一个好的作家可以通过他的文字呈现，相信你自己和你的观点，建立自己的风格。I：人云亦云的后来者总是被打上“模仿““抄袭”的标签，塑造自己的风格才是在市场上生存的方式

Q2 The Audience 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. This may seem to be a paradox. Earlier I warned that the reader is an impatient bird, perched on the thin edge of distraction or sleep. Now I’m saying you must write for yourself and not be gnawed by worry over whether the reader is tagging along. I’m talking about two different issues. One is craft, the other is attitude. The first is a question of mastering a precise skill. The second is a question of how you use that skill to express your personality. First, work hard to master the tools. Simplify, prune and strive for order. Think of this as a mechanical act, and soon your sentences will become cleaner. The act will never become as mechanical as, say, shaving or shampooing; you will always have to think about the various ways in which the tools can be used. But at least your sentences will be grounded in solid principles, and your chances of losing the reader will be smaller.

P：不要想着我的观众在哪里，我为了怎样的群体在写书，不要试图去想象你的观众，不要去迎合某个市场或出版商，读者只有在读了书之后才知道他们想要看的是什么书，其次读者也会换新的口味。读者是很容易失去耐心的，因此你要把文字写得精炼，这是写作技艺，但同时你又拥有自己的写作风格，这是写作态度。去精进你的写作技艺，简化提纯避免废话，你的文字会建立在最坚实的基本功上，你失去读者的可能性也会变小。

Q3 Words Don’t let yourself get in this position. The only way to avoid it is to care deeply about words. If you find yourself writing that someone recently enjoyed a spell of illness, or that a business has been enjoying a slump, ask yourself how much they enjoyed it. Notice the decisions that other writers make in their choice of words and be finicky about the ones you select from the vast supply. The race in writing is not to the swift but to the original. Make a habit of reading what is being written today and what was written by earlier masters. 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. But cultivate the best models Also get in the habit of using dictionaries And don’t scorn that bulging grab bag Roget’s Thesaurus Also bear in mind, when you’re choosing words and stringing them together, how they sound. This may seem absurd: readers read with their eyes. But in fact they hear what they are reading far more than you realize. Therefore such matters as rhythm and alliteration are vital to every sentence

P：关注你文章中使用的词汇，不要享受无用的华丽的词汇堆叠形成的文章。养成阅读大师经典的习惯，注意他们所用的词汇，写作是从模仿开始学习的，养成查字典的习惯，了解同义词，最后当你选择了词汇并将他们组合在一起，去朗读一下。I：不是能写书登报的就代表着他是一个好作家，如果要模仿，选择名家模仿，开创自己的风格并不代表着要推翻文字语句的组成方式。

Q4 Usage Good usage, to me, consists of using good words if they already exist—as they almost always do—to express myself clearly and simply to someone else

P：选择准备的词汇，简洁明白地表达你自己

1. transactionOut of it come two of the most important qualities that this book will go in search of: humanity and warmth.2.simplicityWriting 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 thatwriting is hard, it's because it is hard.

...and whatever form the sentences take will reflect the writer at his most natural.

...rewriting is the essence of writing

"What do you do on the day when it isn't going well?" Dr. Brock was asked. He said he just stopped writing and put the work aside for a day when it would go better. I then said that the professional writer must establish a daily schedule and stick to it. I said that writing is a craft, not an art, and that the man who runs away from his crafts because he lacks inspiration is fooling himself. He is also going broke.

...professional writers are solitary drudges who seldom see other writers.

As for students, anyone might think we left them bewildered. But in fact we gave them a broader glimpse of the writing process than if only one of us had talked...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.

But all of them are vulnerable and all of them are tense. They are driven by a compulsion to put some part of themselves on paper, and yet they don't just write what comes naturally. They sit down to commit an act of literature, and the self who emerges on paper is far stiffer than the person who sat down to write. The problem is to find the real man or woman behind the tension.

...the most important quilities that this book will go in search of: humanity and warmth.

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. It's an question of using the English language in a way that will achieve the greatest clarilty and strength.

Q1 Unity Unity is the anchor of good writing. So, first, get your unities straight. Unity not only keeps the reader from straggling off in all directions; it satisfies your readers’ subconscious need for order and reassures them that all is well at the helm. Therefore choose from among the many variables and stick to your choice. One choice is unity of pronoun Unity of tense is another choice,you must choose the tense in which you are principally going to address the reader, no matter how many glances you may take backward or forward along the way Another choice is unity of mood Therefore ask yourself some basic questions before you start. For example: “In what capacity am I going to address the reader?” (Reporter? Provider of information? Average man or woman?) “What pronoun and tense am I going to use?” “What style?” (Impersonal reportorial? Personal but formal? Personal and casual?) “What attitude am I going to take toward the material?” (Involved? Detached? Judgmental? Ironic? Amused?) “How much do I want to cover?” “What one point do I want to make?” The last two questions are especially important. 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. What you think is definitive today will turn undefinitive by tonight, and writers who doggedly pursue every last fact will find themselves pursuing the rainbow and never settling down to write. Nobody can write a book or an article “about” something. Tolstoy couldn’t write a book about war and peace, or Melville a book about whaling. They made certain reductive decisions about time and place and about individual characters in that time and place—one man pursuing one whale. Every writing project must be reduced before you start to write. Therefore think small. Decide what corner of your subject you’re going to bite off, and be content to cover it well and stop. This is also a matter of energy and morale. An unwieldy writing task is a drain on your enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is the force that keeps you going and keeps the reader in your grip. When your zest begins to ebb, the reader is the first person to know it. As for what point you want to make, 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. It will not only give you a better idea of what route you should follow and what destination you hope to reach; it will affect your decision about tone and attitude. Some points are best made by earnestness, some by dry understatement, some by humor.

P：整合：人称、时态、语调、形式、态度。想明白你想要表达什么，想要避免什么。每个作家都有他擅长和不擅长的内容书写，在开始写作前想明白再动笔。决定你要写哪一块内容，完全准备并覆盖然后停下来，不管你想要写几个观点，让它们给读者留下深刻的印象。I：写作就好像一部电影，想要覆盖几个基调，悬疑、搞笑、家庭、爱情、枪战各种元素混为一体，想要做出伟大的作品，不是不可能，而是难度太大，因为每一种元素和基调都会使观众分心，与其做高大全不如精于一个点，在这个点的各个方面整合在一起，呈现出吸引人的、完整的故事，让观众完全沉浸到你的作品中。

Q2 The Lead and the Ending 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. Of such a progression of sentences, each tugging the reader forward until he is hooked, a writer constructs that fateful unit, the “lead.”

P：开头极为重要，如果开头不能吸引读者读下去，那么这部作品就已经死了。I：开头是故事的碎片，你只露出一角吸引读者自己去揭开剩下的部分。

Q3 The perfect ending should take your readers slightly by surprise and yet seem exactly right. They didn’t expect the article to end so soon, or so abruptly, or to say what it said. But they know it when they see it. Like a good lead, it works. It’s like the curtain line in a theatrical comedy. We are in the middle of a scene (we think), when suddenly one of the actors says something funny, or outrageous, or epigrammatic, and the lights go out. We are startled to find the scene over, and then delighted by the aptness of how it ended. What delights us is the playwright’s perfect control. For the nonfiction writer, the simplest way of putting this into a rule is: 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 The surprise it carries is tremendous. How could it not be a perfect ending? Surprise is the most refreshing element in nonfiction writing. If something surprises you it will also surprise—and delight—the people you are writing for, especially as you conclude your story and send them on their way

P：一个好的结尾是你一点一点引导读者，读者如身临其境，最后自然发生，控制故事的节奏非常重要。对于非小说作家，最简单结尾的方式就是当你准备好停下来，那么就停下来，如果你已经陈述了所有观点和事实，那么就找最近的出口结束。最后在非虚拟写作中，结尾给读者一个惊喜是非常有效的。I：写作和电影的相似，合理的故事节奏，起承转合，贴切的开头和结尾，以及结尾的彩蛋。

Q4 10 Bits & Pieces VERBS. Use active verbs unless there is no comfortable way to get around using a passive verb. The difference between an activeverb style and a passive-verb style—in clarity and vigor—is the difference between life and death for a writer. “Joe saw him” is strong. “He was seen by Joe” is weak. The first is short and precise; it leaves no doubt about who did what. The second is necessarily longer and it has an insipid quality: something was done by somebody to someone else. It’s also ambiguous. How often was he seen by Joe? Once? Every day? Once a week? A style that consists of passive constructions will sap the reader’s energy. Nobody ever quite knows what is being perpetrated by whom and on whom. Don’t choose one that is dull or merely serviceable. Make active verbs activate your sentences, and avoid the kind that need an appended preposition to complete their work. Don’t set up a business that you can start or launch. Don’t say that the president of the company stepped down. Did he resign? Did he retire? Did he get fired? Be precise. Use precise verbs.

P：不要使用被动态，相较主动语态被动态更模棱两可，它会分散读者的注意力。

ADVERBS Don’t use adverbs unless they do necessary work.

P：不要使用副词，除非它真的起作用。

ADJECTIVES Again, the rule is simple: make your adjectives do work that needs to be done. “He looked at the gray sky and the black clouds and decided to sail back to the harbor.” The darkness of the sky and the clouds is the reason for the decision. If it’s important to tell the reader that a house was drab or a girl was beautiful, by all means use “drab” and “beautiful.” They will have their proper power because you have learned to use adjectives sparsely

P：同副词用法，只有在形容词有存在的必要性的情况下使用它，它才会产生特定的力量。

LITTLE QUALIFIERS Prune out the small words that qualify how you feel and how you think and what you saw: “a bit,” “a little,” “sort of,” “kind of,” “rather,” “quite,” “very,” “too,” “pretty much,” “in a sense” and dozens more. They dilute your style and your persuasiveness

P：剔除修饰语，因为它会稀释你所表达的程度。

PUNCTUATION The Period. There’s not much to be said about the period except that most writers don’t reach it soon enough. If you find yourself hopelessly mired in a long sentence, it’s probably because you’re trying to make the sentence do more than it can reasonably do—perhaps express two dissimilar thoughts. The quickest way out is to break the long sentence into two short sentences, or even three. There is no minimum length for a sentence that’s acceptable in the eyes of God Among good writers it is the short sentence that predominates, and don’t tell me about Norman Mailer—he’s a genius. If you want to write long sentences, be a genius. Or at least make sure that the sentence is under control from beginning to end, in syntax and punctuation, so that the reader knows where he is at every step of the winding trail.

P：学会控制长句，适当使用标点符号和语法规则。

The Exclamation Point Instead, construct your sentence so that the order of the words will put the emphasis where you want it. Also resist using an exclamation point to notify the reader that you are making a joke or being ironic. “It never occurred to me that the water pistol might be loaded!” Readers are annoyed by your reminder that this was a comical moment. They are also robbed of the pleasure of finding it funny on their own. Humor is best achieved by understatement, and there’s nothing subtle about an exclamation point.

P：合理使用感叹号，文章的情绪并不会因为一个感叹号而增加

MOOD CHANGERS Learn to alert the reader as soon as possible to any change in mood from the previous sentence. At least a dozen words will do this job for you: “but,” “yet,” “however,” “nevertheless,” “still,” “instead,” “thus,” “therefore,” “meanwhile,” “now,” “later,” “today,” “subsequently” and several more. I can’t overstate how much easier it is for readers to process a sentence if you start with “but” when you’re shifting direction. Or, conversely, how much harder it is if they must wait until the end to realize that you have shifted

P：文章的情绪转变。没有什么比在句首的“但是”更能直接表达情绪转变。

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 won the game.

P:改写修订，使用更准确的词语，删掉不必要的句子，让文章读起来更为通畅和语感

TRUST YOUR MATERIAL They will also enjoy being allowed to think for themselves. The reader plays a major role in the act of writing and must be given room to play it. 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

P：相信你写的东西，不要过多的解释，让读者成为作品中的一部分，让读者自己去猜测挖掘真相。I总：虽然确实现在市面上的三流文章充斥着滥用长句标点、辞藻堆叠的现象，但如果全然按照作者的观点，通篇文章也是无趣了点。但毫无疑问，文章的简洁是对读者最大的尊重，无论你的写作风格是什么，确保你使用的任何一个字和标点都是有其作用的。身份转换，如果你是读这本书的人，你的感受是什么。