The Century Handbook of Writing

by Garland Greever; Easley S. Jones

60. Avoid wordiness. Strike out words not essential to the thought.

• Roundabout impersonal construction: There are many interesting things which may be seen in New York. [12 words.]
• Better: Many interesting things may be seen in New York. [9 words.]
• Clause to be reduced to a phrase: The skeleton which stood in the office of Dr. Willard was terrifying to little Cecil. [15 words.]
• Right: The skeleton in Dr. Willard's office was terrifying to little Cecil. [11 words.]
• Clause and phrase each to be reduced to a word: Men who cared only for their individual interests were now in a state of discouragement. [15 words.]
• Right: Selfish men were now discouraged. [5 words.]
• Separate predication in excess: That day I was shocking wheat behind the binder. Shocking wheat behind the binder was my usual job in harvest. That day while I was working at this job, I found a nest full of partridge eggs. [37 words.]
• Right: That day, while shocking wheat behind the binder, my usual job in harvest, I found a nest full of partridge eggs. [21 words.]
• Ponderous scientific terms for simple ideas: Since, according to the physicists, the per cent of efficiency of a machine is equal to the amount of energy put in, divided by the amount of useful work performed, it naturally follows that in all human activities, unnecessary friction, since it lowers the amount of nervous energy, is going to lower the per cent of efficiency. While we may never reach an astonishing degree of efficiency by economizing nervous energy, nevertheless, if we consistently and perseveringly try to spare ourselves all unnecessary labor and exertion, we shall have an abundant supply of energy to direct into channels of usefulness. [100 words.]
• Right: If we economize our strength, we can make our actions more efficient and useful. [14 words.]
• Inflated writing: She was supreme in beauty among the daughters of Eve whom his ravished eyes had hitherto beheld. [17 words.]
• Right: She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. [10 words.]

[Note.]—A special form of wordiness is tautology—the useless repetition of an idea in different words.

• Gross tautology: He had an entire monopoly of the whole fruit trade. [This is like saying "black blackbird.">[
• Right: He had a monopoly of the fruit trade.
• Tautological expressions:
  • this here
  • where at
  • return back
  • ascend up
  • repeat again
  • biography of his life
  • good benefits
  • fellow playmates
  • Hallowe'en evening
  • important essentials
  • indorse on the back
  • connect up
  • meet up with
  • combined together
  • perfectly all right
  • utter absence of
  • quite round
  • absolutely annihilated
  • still continue to
  • absolutely new creation
  • necessary requisite
  • total effect of all this

Exercise:

1. The people who act the parts in a play want the people who witness the performance to applaud them.
2. There is an oily grass which is found on the prairie, and which is called mesquite grass, and it covers the prairie.
3. You wish to call the operator. You take the receiver from the hook. By taking the receiver from the hook you call the operator.
4. At last the employer of the men, and those who were employed by him, having compromised their difficulties, effected a settlement, and reached an amicable understanding agreeable to both parties.
5. The two merchants joined up their forces together in order to secure a monopoly of the entire trade of the village. There was one absolutely essential preliminary which they thought must necessarily precede everything else. It was that they should take all the old shop-worn articles and dispose of them by selling them as bargains at a reduced rate.

[Triteness]

61. Avoid trite or hackneyed expressions. Such expressions may be tags from everyday speech (the worse for wear, had the time of my life); or stale phrases from newspapers (taken into custody, the officiating clergyman); or humorous substitutions (ferocious canine, paternal ancestor); or forced synonyms (gridiron heroes, the Hoosier metropolis); or conventional fine writing (reigns supreme, wind kissed the tree-tops); or oft-repeated euphemisms (limb for leg, pass away for die); or overworked quotations from literature (monarch of all I survey, footprints on the sands of time).

List of trite expressions:

• along these lines
• meets the eye
• feathered songsters
• a long-felt want
• the last sad rites
• launched into eternity
• last but not least
• doomed to disappointment
• at one fell swoop
• sadder but wiser
• did justice to a dinner
• a goodly number
• budding genius
• beggars description
• a dull thud
• silence broken only by
• wended their way
• abreast of the times
• trees stood like sentinels
• method in his madness
• sun-kissed meadows
• tired but happy
• hoping you are the same
• nipped in the bud
• the happy pair
• seething mass of humanity
• specimen of humanity
• with bated breath
• green with envy
• the proud possessor
• too full for utterance
• a pugilistic encounter
• conspicuous by its absence
• with whom they come in contact
• exception proves the rule
• favor with a selection
• as luck would have it
• more easily imagined than described
• where ignorance is bliss