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Editor’s Column The Elements of Style
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A sonnet is built on a fourteen-line frame, each line ur chief role as lawyers is to communicate effectively, orally containing five feet. Hence, sonneteers know exactly and in writing. This is easier said than done. Good writing is where they are headed, although they may not know how a skill that we practice, and improve upon, over the course of our to get there. Most forms of composition are less clearly lives. While I most certainly fail to achieve the goal I set for myself defined, more flexible, but all have skeletons to which the in terms of proficiency, the important thing is to continue striving writer will bring the flesh and the blood. The more clearly towards improvement. the writer perceives the shape, the better are the I spend a good amount of time every year chances of success. inducting my juniors into the cult of good writing. On the active voice, which brings us right back to It is a benevolent cult, with the aim of elevating the brevity:3 writing of those with whom I work. Our holy book is “The Elements of Style” by William Strunk Jr. and Use the active voice. E. B. White of “Charlotte’s Webb” fame. I buy extra The active voice is usually more direct and vigorous copies to distribute. “The Elements of Style” is a than the passive: precious tome of only a hundred pages. However, packed within these few pages is the foundation of I shall always remember my first visit to clear and persuasive writing. Boston. I wish to share a smattering of helpful gems This is much better than from “The Elements of Style”, which are applicable My first visit to Boston will always be rememto our daily practices whether we are drafting argubered by me. ment or an email to a client. Elizabeth Fashler […] 1 On brevity, a struggle for most lawyers: The habitual use of the active voice, however, Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence makes for forcible writing. This is true not only in should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no narrative concerned principally with action but in writing unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawof any kind. Many a tame sentence of description or expoing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no sition can be made lively and emphatic by substituting a unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make transitive in the active voice for some such perfunctory all sentences short or avoid all detail and treat subjects expression as there is or could be heard. only in outline, but that every word tell. Dead leaves covered the There were a great number On structure:2 ground. of dead leaves lying on the Choose a suitable design and hold to it. ground. A basic structural design underlies every kind of writing. Writers will in part follow this design, in part deviAt dawn the crowing of a The cock’s crow came with ate from it, according to their skills, their needs, and the rooster could be heard. dawn. unexpected events that accompany the act of composition. Writing, to be effective, must follow closely the thoughts Failing health compelled The reason he left college of the writer, but not necessarily in the order in which him to leave college. was that his health became those thoughts occur. This calls for a scheme of procedure. impaired. In some cases, the best design is no design, as with a love Note, in the examples above, that when a sentence is letter, which is simply an outpouring, or with a casual made stronger, it usually becomes shorter. Thus, brevity is essay, which is a ramble. But in most cases, planning a by-product of vigor. must be a deliberate prelude to writing. The first principle of composition, therefore, is to foresee or determine the shape of what is to come and pursue that shape.
Transportation Lawyers Association • Canadian Transport Lawyers Association • October 2021, Vol. 23, No. 2
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