Ethan Canin Quotes

Good writing does not come from verbiage but from words.

The chief virtue that language can have is clearness, and nothing detracts from it so much as the use of unfamiliar words.

Aim for brevity while avoiding jargon.

I've really tried to strip my writing of as many adjectives and adverbs as I possibly can.

It behooves us to avoid archaisms. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.

Writing for me is cutting out the fat and getting to the meaning.

Wordiness is a sickness of American writing. Too many words dilute and blur ideas.

Adverbs lead to overwriting. Try taking them out and reading your prose again to see how it sounds. Simple and less words are more powerful.

We should constantly use the most common, little, easy words which our language affords.

Never use a long word where a short one will do.

Short words are best and the old words when short are best of all.

Omit needless words.

I'm fighting against the bad poet who is prone to using too many words.

Brevity and conciseness are the parents of correction.

There are writers who pour out words, concepts that sound really important but that basically say nothing. I always tried to be as concise as possible, all to try and reach everyone, but especially the simple people, those who needed to be reached more than anyone else.

Anyone can make an article longer; the skill is keeping it tight and lean.

Easy reading is damn hard writing.

Words easy to be understood do often hit the mark; when high and learned ones do only pierce the air.

Broadly speaking, the short words are the best, and the old words best of all.

I've simplified much more in my writing. I say what I've got to say, not in metaphor.

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.

I love the right words. I think economy and precision of language are important.

I work real hard so the reader doesn't have to. I don't want them to have to look up words.

To make yourself understood you have to think plain and write plain.

It is excellent discipline for an author to feel that he must say all he has to say in the fewest possible words, or his reader is sure to skip them; and in the plainest possible words, or his reader will certainly misunderstand them. Generally, also, a downright fact may be told in a plain way; and we want downright facts at present more than anything else.