William Zinsser Quotes

Quotes about:

• Writing is thinking on paper.

  William Zinsser

  Writing, Thinking, Paper

  46 Copy quote

  Report

• 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

  Writing, Hard Work, People

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.9, Harper Collins

  26 Copy quote

  Report

• Hard writing makes easy reading. Easy writing makes hard reading.

  William Zinsser

  Reading, Writing, Easy

  23 Copy quote

  Report

• 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

  Writing, Thinking, Soul

  20 Copy quote

  Report

• Four basic premises of writing: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity.

  William Zinsser

  Inspirational, Writing, Simplicity

  19 Copy quote

  Report

• Writing is linear and sequential; Sentence B must follow Sentence A, and Sentence C must follow Sentence B, and eventually you get to Sentence Z. The hard part of writing isn't the writing; it's the thinking. 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

  Writing, Thinking, Doe

  8 Copy quote

  Report

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

  William Zinsser

  Writing, Shapes, Narrative

  7 Copy quote

  Report

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

  William Zinsser

  Writing, People, Style

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.17, Harper Collins

  7 Copy quote

  Report

• 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

  Writing, Doe, Needs

  6 Copy quote

  Report

• If the nails are weak, your house will collapse. If your verbs are weak and your syntax is rickety, your sentences will fall apart.

  William Zinsser

  Fall, House, Nails

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.18, Harper Collins

  7 Copy quote

  Report

• Examine every word you put on paper. You'll find a surprising number that don't serve any purpose.

  William Zinsser

  Numbers, Purpose, Paper

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.12, Harper Collins

  7 Copy quote

  Report

• 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

  Writing, Competition, Trying

  8 Copy quote

  Report

• There's not much to be said about the period except that most writers don't reach it soon enough.

  William Zinsser

  Soon Enough, Enough, Said

  7 Copy quote

  Report

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

  William Zinsser

  Writing, Jargon, Disease

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.6, Harper Collins

  28 Copy quote

  Report

• Also bear in mind, when you're choosing your 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.

  William Zinsser

  Reading, Eye, Mind

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.35, Harper Collins

  7 Copy quote

  Report

• If you write for yourself, you'll reach all the people you want to write for.

  William Zinsser

  Writing, People, Want

  6 Copy quote

  Report

• To defend what you've written is a sign that you are alive.

  William Zinsser

  Writing, Marketing, Alive

  5 Copy quote

  Report

• Writing is a craft not an art.

  William Zinsser

  Inspirational, Art, Writing

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.4, Harper Collins

  5 Copy quote

  Report

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

  William Zinsser

  Writing, People, Perfection

  7 Copy quote

  Report

• My commodity as a writer, whatever I'm writing about, is me. And your commodity is you. Don't alter your voice to fit the subject. Develop one voice that readers will recognize when they hear it on the page, a voice that's enjoyable not only in its musical line but in its avoidance of sounds that would cheapen its tone: breeziness and condescension and clichés.

  William Zinsser

  Writing, Voice, Musical

  2 Copy quote

  Report

• I think a sentence is a fine thing to put a preposition at the end of.

  William Zinsser

  Thinking, Ends, Fine Things

  4 Copy quote

  Report

• 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

  Country, Writing, Thinking

  William Zinsser (2012). “On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction”, p.24, Harper Collins

  2 Copy quote

  Report

• Writing and learning and thinking are the same process.

  William Zinsser

  Writing, Learning, Thinking

  0 Copy quote

  Report

• Be grateful for every word you can cut.

  William Zinsser

  Grateful, Writing, Cutting

  0 Copy quote

  Report

• 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

  Being Yourself, Writing, Say Anything

  1 Copy quote

  Report

Page 1 of 6

← Prev

1

2

3

4

5

6

Next →

• facebook
• twitter
• googleplus
• email
• linkedin