Who needs action when you’ve got words?
—The Meat Puppets
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I just sit at the typewriter and curse a bit.—P.G. Woodhouse on his writing technique
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A burro is an ass. A burrow is a hole in the ground. As a journalist you are expected to know the difference.—The UPI Stylebook
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She felt in italics and thought in capitals.—Henry James
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One word of caution about the use of acronyms is in order. The apparent stranger at a cocktail party who slaps you on the back with a jovial “Where’ve you been all these years, you old son-of-a-gun?” is a disconcerting chap. You should know him, but you can’t place him for the life of you. Strangers like this occasionally grin at readers out of magazine articles and news stories.—Theodore M. Bernstein
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It’s a wise dog that scratches his own fleas.—William Strunk
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What we require is neither a language that is cramped nor a language gone wild.—Theodore M. Bernstein
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The Three Rules for When to Use Apostrophe’s
1. To Indicate Contractions.
Example: “This childbirth really hurt’s!”
2. In Herpetological Phrases
Example: “There’s snake’s in the Nut ’n’ Honey!”
3. In Letters to Customer Service.
Example: “Dear Moron’s:”—Satire from Dave Barry
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Math is hard.—Barbie
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If you take hyphens seriously, you will surely go mad.—John Benbow
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Try to preserve an author’s style if he is an author and has a style.—Woolcott Gibbs
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That’s not writing, that’s typing.—Truman Capote, on the work of Jack Kerouac
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Some editors are failed writers, but so are most writers.—T.S. Eliot
For more editing wisdom from Bill Walsh, see this earlier post: Bill Walsh, a Copy Editor Who Could Make You Smile.
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