I’ve been recommending Mark Twain’s treatise “Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offenses” for years now. Read it! You’ll learn a lot about writing, and you’ll enjoy a few laughs.

Here are Twain’s points 12-18, with my own comments beneath. He says that these “little rules” require that the author shall:

Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it.

When you merely come near to it, your reader might be confused. Worse, your reader might not be confused; he might accept as true what you don’t mean.

If you mean to say “Wednesday at 3:00″ don’t say “later.”  If you say “most of the team,” don’t be surprised if most of the team thinks you didn’t mean them.

Use the right word, not its second cousin.

English is a flexible, absorptive language full of words that convey slight but definite shades of meaning. Consider rain, sleet, drizzle, sprinkle, downpour, shower, and storm.

Take advantage of MS Word’s synonym feature: Select any word in an MS Word document, then right click. On the menu, select Synonym. Review the  list of synonyms on the sub-menu. Click any synonym on the list to replace your original word.

Eschew surplusage.

Avoid excess. That includes which words you use and how many of them.  As Twain himself says, elsewhere,  “Substitute “damn” every time you’re inclined to write “very”; your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.”

Not omit necessary details.

Consider your readers. Just today I saw a newspaper ad for the upcoming Renaissance Faire. It gave every detail; open hours, entrance fee, types of vendors and exhibits, everything  except the location.

Avoid slovenliness of form.

Care! Show some respect to your reader, to your own intellect, and to the power of the English language.

Use good grammar.

Rusty on rules of grammar? Google “good grammar” and get about 8,550,000 results  in 0.15 seconds. Learn one rule a week and you’ll be more than competent in no time.

Employ a simple and straightforward style.

PlainLanguage.gov has excellent advice on ways you can write simple and clearly. Yes, it’s a government site. If they care about communicating, shouldn’t we all?