Post-reading

The Rules 1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

Dead Metaphors Dead metaphors are metaphors that have been so overused that they’ve lost their figurative qualities. For example: When he returned from vacation, memos, documents and vouchers were strewn across his desk. He took off his coat and dove in. This metaphor—to dive in—was once fresh, but has become so common that readers don’t think of the imagery of water and a diver so much as the meaning of the phrase—to immerse fully in a task. Clichés rely on overly familiar language, whether figurative or literal. Dead metaphors are clichés

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.

Jargon acts as a barrier, rather than a pathway to communication The expression is unclear, wordy, weak, awkward or ugly. When words exclude, mystify, confuse or obscure the truth, the language fails to do its job: communicate! Jargon is also specialized language used in, for example, a science, where it is often appropriate. This use of jargon is appropriate here because it abbreviates.

6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Four Questions to ask What am I trying to say? What words will express it? What image will make it clearer? Is this image fresh enough to have an effect?

Political writing is bad writing It corrupts language.

What is above all needed is to let the meaning choose the word, and not the other way about.