Yevgeny Zamyatin Quotes

It has often been said there’s so much to be read, you never can cram all those words in your head. So the writer who breeds more words than he needs is making a chore for the reader who reads. That's why my belief is the briefer the brief is, the greater the sigh of the reader's relief is. And that's why your books have such power and strength. You publish with shorth! (Shorth is better than length.)

I'm short and to the point.

Vigorous writing is concise.

Do not say a little in many words but a great deal in a few.

Be brief. Above all things be brief.

Be brief, be pointed, let your matter standLucid in order, solid and at hand;Spend not your words on trifles but condense;Strike with the mass of thought, not drops of sense;Press to close with vigor, once begun,And leave, (how hard the task!) leave off, when done.

Conciseness is underrated

I think precision in writing goes hand in hand with not trying to say everything. You try and say two-thirds, so the reader will involve himself or herself.

Not that the story need be long, but it will take a long while to make it short.

The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.

Brevity in writing is the best insurance for its perusal.

The best sentence? The shortest.

All pleasantry should be short; and it might even be as well were the serious short also.

In heaven, when the blessed use the telephone they will say what they have to say and not a word besides.

Use half as many words and they'll hit twice as hard.

There is need of brevity, that the thought may run on.

Whatever is worth saying, can be stated in fifty words or less.

The secret of force in writing lies not so much in the pedigree of nouns and adjectives and verbs, as in having something that you believe in to say, and making the parts of speech vividly conscious of it.

Every word you add dilutes the sentence.

I am a minimalist. I like saying the most with the least.

I usually write very few stage directions. I think a lot of that is a waste of time. The art of screenwriting is in its terseness, saying a lot with a little. I have no patience when I read a script where the writer describes this guy and what he's wearing and his glasses and his hair.

Never use five words if you can get away with one, eh? I've known dead men talk more than you do.

Everything that is exact is short.

A good quotation must be a complete entity. It must be like a headline - sharp, clear, whole.

What a labour writing is ... making one sentence do the work of a page; that's what I call hard work.