William Zinsser

"Four basic premises of writing: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity."

"This is a book by a writer who does some teaching, not a book by a teacher who does some writing, and one of the satisfactions of the craft is that there's always something new to learn."

"Good writing has an aliveness that keeps the reader reading from one paragraph to the next, and it's not a question of gimmicks to "personalize" the author."

"We are a society strangling in unnecessary words, circular constructions, pompous frills and meaningless jargon."

"Writing is hard work. A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first time, or even the third time. Remember this in moments of despair. If you find that writing is hard, it's because it is hard. It's one of the hardest things that people do."

"Writing improves in direct ratio to the number of things we can keep out of it that shouldn't be there."

"Nobody becomes Tom Wolfe overnight, not even Tom Wolfe."

"A writer will do anything to avoid the act of writing."

"Good writers are visible just behind their words."

"You are writing for yourself."

"If you lose the dullards back in the dust, that's where they belong. You don't want them anyway."

"Make a habit of reading what is being written today and what has been written before. Writing is learned by imitation."

"The writer who cares about usage must always know the quick from the dead."

"It's a fitting irony that under Richard Nixon "launder" became a dirty word."

"All writing is ultimately a question of solving a problem."

"Writing is thinking on paper, or talking to someone on paper. If you can think clearly, or if you can talk to someone about the things you know and care about, you can write - with confidence and enjoyment."

"Journalism is writing that first appears in any periodic journal."

"Be a writer. Write things down."

"I've never heard anybody smile."

"People and places are the twin pillars on which most nonfiction is built. Every human event happens somewhere, and the reader wants to know what that somewhere was like."

"Probably the finest travel book ever written by an American is Walden, though Thoreau only went a mile out of town."

"If you write for yourself, you'll reach all the people you want to write for."

"Memoir is the art of inventing the truth."

"Good writing is lean and confident."

"Nobody ever stopped reading E. B. White or V. S. Pritchett because the writing was too good."

"Never hesitate to imitate another writer - every person learning a craft or an art needs models. Eventually you'll find your own voice and will shed the skin of the writer you imitated."

"The best way to learn to write is to study the work of the men and women who are doing the kind of writing you want to do."

"Pure nonsense is a joy forever, as Keats didn't quite say. I love to see a writer flying high, just for the hell of it."

"The writers job is like solving a puzzle, and finally arriving at a solution is a tremendous satisfaction."

"You must find some way to elevate your act of writing into entertainment."

"My roster of the new literature, in short, would include all the writers who come bearing new information and who present it with vigor, clarity and humanity."