How To Write Good

Estimated reading time: 1 minute(s)

There is no shortage of sharing these days thanks to the wonderful world wide web. I receive many forwarded emails from my dads, and I see many friends posting via Facebook and other such media various content created by others.

Below is one share that I decided must be shared again!

I’m not sure these rules are actually worth following (I’d say some are definitely not) but most of them got a good laugh out of me, and I think they will you, too.

The original list is longer than this. Google tells me that it was published by Frank Visco in the Writer’s digest in June 1986. I found a version that was posted March 20, 1995. (That’s near the infancy of the Web. Neat!)

Without further ado …

How To Write Good

  1. Avoid alliteration. Always.
  2. Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
  3. Avoid cliches like the plague. (They’re old hat.)
  4. Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.
  5. One should never generalize.
  6. Comparisons are as bad as cliches.
  7. Be more or less specific.
  8. One-word sentences? Eliminate.
  9. Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.
  10. Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.
  11. Who needs rhetorical questions?

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