Ultimately the product that any writer has to sell is not the subject being written about, but who he or she is. The problem is to find the real man or woman behind the tension. They sit down to commit an act of literature, and the self who emerges on paper is far stiffer than the person who sat down to write. They are driven by a compulsion to put some part of themselves on paper, and yet they don’t just write what comes naturally. Some people write their first draft in one long burst and then revise others can’t write the second paragraph until they have fiddled endlessly with the first. But all of them are vulnerable and all of them are tense. Some write by hand, some by word processor, some by talking into a tape recorder. Some people need silence, others turn on the radio. Some people write by day, others by night. Book Summary of ‘On Writing Well’ by ‘William Zinsser’ Part 1: Principles The Transaction The words, after all, come from a master of the craft. The summary is lengthy but dense in insights. For example, the excluded sub-chapters were about writing about people, writing about places, writing about yourself, etc. I decided to exclude them because those sub-chapters focussed on how to write a specific kind of genre. My summary includes highlights from all, except a few sub-chapters of the third chapter of forms. ‘On Writing Well’ is divided into four chapters - principles, methods, forms & attitudes - with each chapter having sub-chapters of their own. Kilpatrick, said that if he were limited to just one book on how to write, it would William Zinsser’s On Writing Well.Ĭredentials and testimonials aside, as someone who likes to write, I enjoyed reading ‘On Writing Well.’ The book helped me sharpen my writing toolset, identify areas of the craft I should learn more about & rejuvenated my passion for writing. In his book, The Writer’s Art, author James J.
To date, it has served as the canonical writing book for three generations of writers, journalists, & editors. He also wrote 18 books in a writing career spanning more than half a century.įirst published in 1976, ‘ On Writing Well‘ is widely regarded as his best work. In the 1970s, he taught a writing class at Yale University. Before I briefly explain the note-taking process, I want to take a few sentences to introduce William Zinsser, the author of ‘On Writing Well.’Ī lifelong nonfiction writer, William began his career as a journalist for the New York Herald Tribune in 1946.
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