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Loading... On Writing Well: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfictionby William Knowlton Zinsser (otherwise under William Zinsser)
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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. I've read some guides about how to write well, and they've always had such terrible advice and used such awful, vulgar examples (usually taken from their own genre fiction) that I had abandoned all hope. Ostensibly, Zinsser's book is about writing nonfiction, but it works well for every kind of writing, and is the best guide to writing I have ever read. (  ) soylentgreen23 | Nov 16, 2009 |  When I first picked this book up the cover screamed at me "25th Anniversary Edition. More than 1 Million Copies Sold!" and I thought, great, it's a textbook. Curiously, it wasn't a textbook that any of my classes used. I had never heard of it, or of Mr. Zinsser, how good could it possibly be? The truth? It's excellent. This is the writing book I wish someone had been kind enough to give to me in high school. Or at least require me to read for one of my college courses. Or even just highly suggest it. Zinsser practices what he teaches. It's direct and it's clear and it's entertaining. It has earned it's five stars from me. The only thing I found wrong with this book was that I want to read all the books and authors he used as examples and now Mt. TBR has suffered an avalanche of catastrophic proportions. ( ) VictoriaPL | Aug 29, 2009 | Excellent book on writing and thinking about writing. Zinsser covers a wide breadth of topics, from writing memoirs, to writing about travel, to writing about sports, and more. He makes it very simple - write about people doing things, and write more like you speak than less. Good chapter on organizing a longer work as well. ( ) tgraettinger | Jun 16, 2009 | My job requires me to be able to write well, and this book really helped me to hone my writing skills. Zinsser's advice and techniques are concrete and specific, and after applying his suggestions and theories to my own work, I improved my style tremendously. ( ) wahmreader | Apr 13, 2009 | On Writing Well is a simple guide for writing well. Thankfully, as a book about writing should be, it is written well. I found the advice to be accessible and ready to be applied. If you write (and you do) you should read this book. ( ) tyroeternal | Mar 18, 2009 |  no reviews | add a review
Amazon.com (ISBN 0060891548, Paperback)Whether you write an occasional professional letter or a daily newspaper column, William Zinsser's On Writing Well should be required reading. Simplicity is Zinsser's mantra: he preaches a stripped-down writing style, strong and clear. He has no patience for excess (most use of adjectives and adverbs, he writes, just adds clutter) or tired phraseology (for instance, he'd like to outlaw all leads involving those "future archaeologists" most often found "stumbl[ing] upon the remains of our civilization"). He recommends that all writers of nonfiction read their work aloud (don't commit something to paper that you wouldn't actually say) and write under the assumption that "the reader knows nothing" (not to be confused with assuming the reader's an idiot). In addition to the chapters on the expected--usage, audience, interviews, leads--Zinsser also focuses on such trouble spots as science and technical writing, business writing, sports, and humor.(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:10 -0400) The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details. |
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