The Key to Becoming a Better Blog Writer
This is a guest blog post by Michael Mintz, lawyer, Martindale.com blogger, and online strategist.
I recently came across a letter I wrote as a first year attorney. I was shocked at how poorly written it was.
Today, I read an excellent Lexis Communities article on Orwell’s rules for clear writing, called “Inside Baseball and Orwell’s 6 Rules for Clear Writing.” In his 1946 essay, Politics and the English Language, Orwell, provided 6 rules for clear writing:
- Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech, which you are used to seeing in print.
- Never use a long word where a short one will do.
- If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
- Never use the passive where you can use the active.
- Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
- Break any of these rules sooner than say anything barbarous.
If we all adhere to these six rules, we are sure to become better writers. As the writer of “Baseball” correctly states, “If we can think and convey ideas with precision through simple words, then that’s the way to go. It’s the precision of our language, not the number of syllables, that matters.”
Read here for Mike's full blog post.
Here's another little secret...
this approach works in trial too!
Mitch
I've been following those six rules every time I write something, either if it's for something formal, or informal. And so far, it hasn't failed me once.