Some style books are cranky, others cutesy, and most just dull. Then there's The Economist Style Guide (Profile Books, 2010). Largely the work of editor John Grimond, this British guide to writing is helpful, sensible, and refreshingly unstuffy. In other words, it heeds its own advice.
That good advice first shows up in the introduction, which offers eight precepts for keeping our readers engaged.
- Catch the attention of the reader.
Then get straight into the article. Do not spend several sentences clearing your throat, setting the scene or sketching in the background. - Read through your writing several times.
Edit it ruthlessly, whether by cutting or polishing or sharpening, on each occasion. . . . Nothing is to be gained by resorting to orotundities and grandiloquence, still less by calling on clichés and vogue expressions. Unadorned, unfancy prose is usually all you need. - Do not be stuffy.
Use the language of everyday speech, not that of spokesmen, lawyers or bureaucrats. . . . Pomposity and long-windedness tend to obscure meaning, or reveal the lack of it: strip them away in favour of plain words. - Do not be hectoring or arrogant.
Those who disagree with you are not necessarily stupid or insane. Nobody needs to be described as silly: let your analysis show that he is. - Do not be too pleased with yourself.
Don't boast of your own cleverness by telling readers that you correctly predicted something or that you have a scoop. You are more likely to bore or irritate them than to impress them. - Do not be too chatty.
Surprise, surprise is more irritating than informative. So is Ho, ho and, in the middle of a sentence, wait for it, etc. - Do not be too didactic.
If too many sentences begin Compare, Consider, Expect, Imagine, Look at, Note, Prepare for, Remember or Take, readers will think they are reading a textbook (or, indeed, a style book). - Do your best to be lucid.
("I see but one rule: to be clear," Stendhal) Simple sentences help. Keep complicated constructions and gimmicks to a minimum. . . . Clear thinking is the key to clear writing.
As you may have noticed, John Grimond's guide favors British conventions for spelling and punctuation, so Americans should still leave room on their shelves for The Associated Press Stylebook or The Chicago Manual of Style. Still, when it comes to sound advice on topics ranging from jargon ("Avoid it") and short words ("Use them") to critique ("a noun") and panacea ("Beware of cliché"), The Economist Style Guide admirably serves all users of the English language.
If you have no serious intention of eating any less in 2012 or exercising any more, you could do far worse than adopt Grimond's eight rules as your New Year's resolutions.
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Comments
It’s ironic that The Economist itself is loosely edited, with inconsistent hyphenation, inconsistent application of UK rules on punctuating quotations, missing punctuation among independent clauses, failure to use the Oxford (serial) comma even when its absence creates confusion in the reader, infatuation with nonstandard usages like loth, and UK slang.
The literate wordplay in its headers, however, is delightful.
When are we going to stop recycling Strunk & White, with their simple-minded and often wrongheaded rules — rules they break on almost every page of a book you would be wiser to burn than to read.