Keeping it Short in Your Writing

Friday, February 20, 2009
by Jill Earl

With numerous versions of the ’25 Random Things’ craze online, you may be ready to deck the next person tagging you to participate! Instead of resorting to violence, cast your eyes upon this creative take for writers.

Roy Peter Clark, author, and long-time faculty member of The Poynter Institute, came up with ’25 Non-Random Things About Writing Short’, a handy list of steps to short writing. What I really liked about Mr. Clark’s piece was the emphasis on getting rid of excess to keep your writing short and tight, while keeping things light.

One of my favorite tips is number 12: Imagine a short piece from the get-go. Conceive a sonnet, not an epic. I’m visualizing nuggets instead of a whole chicken here.

How about using a journal specifically for your short writing? That’s tip number one and will be created shortly.

You can also find inspiration from quotes of a few writers on the list, such as number 22 from Mark Twain: “You may need more time, not less, to write something good and short.”

For the rest of the list, direct your eyes here: http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=78&aid=158294

Keeping it short in my writing. Okay, I’m on it!

3 comments:

LuAnn said...

As a journalist, I find it more difficult to write long! I've been trained to say the most in the least amount of words!

Anonymous said...

I'd love to reach that point! It will come, I know.

Anonymous said...

It has such a good place in today's world of microblogging, numerous distractions. There's so much going on that it behooves writers to get to the point. Readers either want to be hooked or move on.

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