On Writing Well
In addition to exploring the techniques of nonfiction writing, Zinsser discusses sexism in writing, jargon, and psychological writing blocks.
Stats for nerds
137recommend
235mentions
170people
2007–2026years
80% recommend18% neutral2% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- This is basically the main argument of On Writing Well, Zinsser, William Amazing book.
- One of the good book about writing I read was William Zinsser's "On Writing Well". Striving for simplicity and avoiding clutter was the two first principles described in the book. AI writing feels more like ramblings than communication.
- I love writing with a dash—it packs a punch! On Writing Well by William Zinsser, who taught writing at Yale and Columbia, says this about the dash:
Somehow this invaluable tool is widely regarded as not quite proper—a bumpkin at the genteel dinner table of good English. But it has full membership and will get you out of many tight corners. The dash is used in two ways. One is to amplify or justify in the second part of the sentence a thought you stated in the first part. "We decided to keep going—it was only 100 miles more and we could get there in time for dinner." By its very shape the dash pushes the sentence ahead and explains why they decided to keep going. The other use involves two dashes, which set apart a parenthetical thought within a longer sentence. "She told me to get in the car—she had been after me all summer to have a haircut—and we drove silently into town." An explanatory detail that might otherwise have required a separate sentence is dispatched along the way.
https://dn790000.ca.archive.org/0/items/OnWritingWell/on-wri...
- On Writing Well, by William Zinsser. Hilarious, enlightening, affirming of everyone's need and ability to write well.
- You can also just find a book on writing. I recommend "On Writing Well" by William Zinsser. Dense and quite informative.
- I agree that it's a good distinction to make. Personally I haven't thought about it till I read On Writing Well by William Zinsser. In the book he specifically teaches writing nonfiction and even shares an anecdote where he was a guest on a radio show promoting a writing conference and was annoyed with the host because he conflated writing with literary works.
So yeah, I recommend the book to people interested in writing.
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