Robert Pimm: novels, short stories and more

Home » Fiction » 2 sets of brilliant tips on “how to write”

2 sets of brilliant tips on “how to write”

Follow me on Twitter

I wrote a blog a while back called “how to write“.  It was one of my most popular blogs.

Here are two lists of tips from famous authors about “how to write”.

download

The first list, by George Orwell, is good for style:

  1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
  2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
  3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
  4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
  5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
  6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

The excellent writer Owen Matthews brought to my attention a second list, by Henry Miller. It is good for productivity, ie getting on with writing:

  1. Work on one thing at a time until finished.
  2. Start no more new books, add no more new material to ‘Black Spring’ [ie whatever you’re working on – Ed].
  3. Don’t be nervous. Work calmly, joyously, recklessly on whatever is in hand.
  4. Work according to Program and not according to mood. Stop at the appointed time!
  5. When you can’t create you can work.
  6. Cement a little every day, rather than add new fertilizers.
  7. Keep human! See people, go places, drink if you feel like it.
  8. Don’t be a draught-horse! Work with pleasure only.
  9. Discard the Program when you feel like it—but go back to it next day. Concentrate. Narrow down. Exclude.
  10. Forget the books you want to write. Think only of the book youare writing.
  11. Write first and always. Painting, music, friends, cinema, all these come afterwards.

You can find a million other set of rules on the Internet, but I think these two are a fine start.

P.S. If you enjoy fresh, original writing, please friend me on Facebook or sign up for e-mail updates (top right – see the “click here” blue button).  Check out the range of writing on this site via the sitemap and guide.

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

By in Fiction, Writing: about writing on .

4 Comments

  1. Tippy Rex says:
    10/01/2016 at 20:33

    I love Henry Miller’s “When you can’t create you can work.” The create part feels like magic– like something that may have happened once, but is unlikely to happen again. Every blog post feels like a miracle. Good lists!

    Like

    Reply
  2. Jony says:
    17/01/2016 at 11:04

    The Facebook Effect

    This comment shouldn’t be here since it relates to your Facebook post about people being reluctant to follow links that take them away from FB. But, on leaving the familiar FB territory I find myself having to search for a Comments box on a page that is (of course!) packed with lots of other interesting ideas and articles. This causes brain strain and not in a good way.

    We are all lazy. And many of your readers will be browsing on phones or pads where the jump from one application to another involves screens disappearing and new ones popping up. It’s a hassle to go back to the previous screen so why not just hit the ‘like’ button and move on?

    At least that’s partly what seems to be going on. I have zilch, nada, zero followers on my blog (mainly because it involves logging in and passwords etc and not because it isn’t utterly fascinating….) but quite a few friends who are more than happy to like or comment on a blog post when a link to it pops up on my – and their – FBpage.

    Maybe that’s what’s happening Leigh. Maybe we are all just happier in the comfort zones of our own FB page.

    Like

    Reply
  3. Arts Addict says:
    21/01/2016 at 15:19

    I have always loved the Orwell rules. They embody their own advice, and the last one reminds us that the purpose of all writing is to communicate as best we can. I also commend the (somewhat longer!) guidance on this from Steven Pinker in The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person’s Guide to Writing in the 21st Century.

    Like

    Reply
  4. Writing Advice by: Robert Pimm – Uni-Verse Creative Writing Society says:
    17/07/2019 at 18:31

    […] 2 sets of brilliant tips on „how to write“ […]

    Like

    Reply

Comments welcome

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Google photo

You are commenting using your Google account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Enter your email address to hear about new posts by email

Join 5,553 other followers

%d bloggers like this: