Write Well Now Six Keys to Greater Clarity 2 nd Edition by Darrel Walters Revisionary, Inc. Ft. Washington, PA
Write Well Now: Six Keys to Greater Clarity Copyright 2008, Darrel Walters Second Edition, 2010 a light revision with notable changes to the Study Planner (p. xi) and additions to Appendix B (p. 214) Published by Revisionary, Inc. P.O. Box 1057 Ft. Washington, PA 19034 Inquiries for the author walters@revisionaryinc.com Information about writing seminars and related services.www.revisionaryinc.com ISBN 978 0 9821457 1 5 Write Well Now: Six Keys to Greater Clarity Darrel Walters All rights reserved. Neither this book nor any parts of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except for brief excerpts to be used as part of a critical article or review. ii
CONTENTS List of Figures... vii Acknowledgements... viii Orientation to the Book... ix Study Planner... xi PART ONE: The Six Keys 1. Getting Rid of Words...1 Eliminating Filler...2 Avoiding Redundancy...5 Writing Maturely...8 Writing Unpretentiously...11 Streamlining Sentences and Paragraphs...13 Parting Thoughts About Wordiness...17 Solutions to Chapter One Exercises...18 2. Choosing the Best Words...25 Finding the Just-Right Word (Avoiding Near Misses)...26 Using a Rich Vocabulary (Avoiding Vocabulary Eaters )...28 Putting Verbs in the Driver s Seat (Avoiding Noun Dominance)...36 Keeping People in the Picture (Avoiding Personification)...39 Keeping Readers Grounded (Avoiding Inconsistency)...41 Reaching a Wider Audience (Avoiding Jargon)...42 Staying Sincere (Avoiding Affectation )...45 Staying Believable (Avoiding Overstatement)...49 Showing Conviction (Avoiding Undue Caution)...50 Making Good Connections (Avoiding Imprecise Conjunctions and Prepositions)...53 Using New Words, and Using Old Words in New Ways...54 Solutions to Chapter Two Exercises...55 3. Putting Words in the Best Place...65 Placing Modifiers...66 Placing Adverbs... 69 Placing Subjects...71 iii
Placing Orienting Material...73 Placing Emphatic Material...75 Parting Thoughts About Placement...77 Solutions to Chapter Three Exercises...78 4. Clearing the Reader s Path...83 Choosing Parallel Form...84 Choosing Positive Form...88 Choosing Active Voice...90 Referring to People...93 Achieving Gracefulness...95 Saying What You Mean to Say...99 Parting Thoughts About Reader-Friendly Construction...103 Solutions to Chapter Four Exercises...104 5. Following the Rules of Grammar...111 Grammar Terms and Definitions...112 Common Grammar Errors... 122 Grammatically Incorrect Word Choice...122 Dangling Participle...123 Split Infinitive...123 Careless Use of Prepositions...124 Subject/Verb Disagreement...125 Wrong Verb Tense... 126 Adjective/Adverb Confusion... 126 Wrong Pronoun Case... 127 Antecedent/Pronoun Disagreement...128 The Gender/Grammar Conflict...129 Solutions to Chapter Five Exercises... 138 6. Using Punctuation Wisely... 141 Ending Sentences...142 Writing Contractions, Possessives, and Quotations...144 Negotiating the Wide World of Commas... 147 Understanding the Mysterious Semicolon...154 Using Colons with Confidence...157 Improving Clarity with the Help of Hyphens, Dashes, Slashes, and Parentheses... 159 Using Brackets and Ellipses...161 Solutions to Chapter Six Exercises...163 iv
PART TWO: The Bigger Picture 7. Thinking Beyond Words and Sentences...169 Units of Organization...169 The Paragraph...170 The Section...175 The Document... 177 Summary... 181 8. Establishing an Approach to Writing...182 Preparing to Write...183 Writing...187 Revising... 194 Four Final Thoughts... 199 Bibliography...201 APPENDIX A: A COLLECTION OF USEFUL VERBS...202 APPENDIX B: A COLLECTION OF TROUBLESOME WORDS...213 APPENDIX C: WRITING PRINCIPLES ELABORATED UPON...252 General Index...258 Word Use Index...262 About the Author...264 v
LIST OF FIGURES Chapter One 1. A Few Common Filler Words and Phrases...4 2. A Few Common Redundancies...7 Chapter Two 1. A Few Examples of Complex Words and Simple Alternatives...48 Chapter Five 1. Seven Parts of Speech Defined and Exemplified...112 2. Number, Case, and Gender of Nouns Exemplified...113 3. Number of Verbs Exemplified...113 4. Voice of Verbs Exemplified...113 5. Tense of Verbs Exemplified...114 6. Forms That a Verb Can Be Given...115 7. Forms of Adjectives Exemplified...116 8. Forms of Adverbs Exemplified...116 9. Personal Pronouns Shown by Person, Case, and Number...117 10. Examples of Pronouns and Their Antecedents...117 11. Typical Parts of a Prepositional Phrase...118 12. A Sample List of Prepositions...118 13. Types of Conjunctions...119 14. Samples of Conjunctions, by Type...119 15. The Basic Parts of a Sentence...120 16. Additional Elements of a Sentence...121 17. An Illustration of Phrases and Clauses Functioning as Parts of Speech...121 Chapter Seven 1. APA System for Section Headings...176 vi