The Art of Brevity

After firing off another long missive email the other day, I tweeted a request for resources on the art of brevity. I felt fairly certain that this is one of those things you just have to practice, but wow—people came through with a LOT of suggestions. For posterity, here’s a roundup of the recommendations:

Books

Lots of books! I compiled these into a list on bookshop.org (disclosure).

For transparency, that’s an affiliate link, so I’ll receive a small portion of sales from those books. Please don’t feel the need to buy from Bookshop (though they support small businesses!). Wherever you buy/borrow your books from, I do humbly ask that you avoid making *ahem* massively wealthy mono-retailers any richer.

Online Resources

• Content Design London: Readability Guidelines
• This list compiled by Cheryl Stephens
• This clip from “A River Runs Through It”
• In-progress guidelines for cognitive accessibility

Advice / Personal Process

• Edit!!!
• …and give yourself at least a day between writing and editing your own work.
• Work with an editor, or peer review.
• Cut adverbs and adjectives.
• Cut out unnecessary words, ruthlessly.
• Break down compound sentences and clauses.
• Use active voice.
• More literally, read your words aloud.
• Or explain a concept out loud to another person—then write that down!
• Use semantic line breaks as a “code smell” for run-on sentences.
• Have clarity of purpose.
• Ask yourself: “Do people need to know that at this point?”

What are your favorite tips on brevity? Feel free to chime in on Twitter or shoot me an email!