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Quote by William Zinsser

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

Quote by William Zinsser

Author

William Zinsser

William Zinsser was an American writer renowned for his concise, clear, and humorous writing style. His works spanned a variety of fields including literature, history, and practical writing, with his most famous titles being 'On Writing Well' and 'American Writing'. Zinsser's writing style has had a profound impact on modern writing. more

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“If you would like to write better than everybody else, you have to want to write better than everybody else. You must take an obsessive pride in the smallest details of your craft. And you must be willing to defend what you've written against the various middlemen - editors, agents and publishers - whose sights may be different from yours, whose standards not so high.”

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

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“Journalism is writing that first appears in any periodic journal.”

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“Keep your paragraphs short. Writing is visual - it catches the eye before it has a chance to catch the brain.”

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

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“Many writers are paralyzed by the thought that they are competing with everybody else who is trying to write and presumably doing it better.... Forget the competition and go at your own pace. Your only contest is with yourself.”

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“Memoir is the art of inventing the truth.”

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“Memoir isn't the summary of a life; it's a window into a life, very much like a photograph in its selective composition. It may look like a casual and even random calling up of bygone events. It's not; it's a deliberate construction.”

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“Most writers sow adjectives almost unconsciously into the soil of their prose to make it more lush and pretty. The sentences become longer and longer as they fill up with stately elms and graceful boughs and frisky kittens and sleepy lagoons.”

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“Much of my writing has taken the form of a pilgrimage: to sacred places that represent the best of America, to musicians and other artists who represent the best of their art.”

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