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George Orwell’s 5 Rules for Effective Writing

pickthebrain.com — This is hardly a recent problem, and as George Orwell wrote in his 1946 essay, Politics and the English Language, the condition is curable. By following Orwell ’s 5 rules for effective writing, you’ll distinguish yourself from competitors and clearly communicate your ideas.

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  • zappa717, on 01/26/2008, -1/+9Sounds like good advice.
    • xsuite, on 01/26/2008, -10/+4Orwell was a great writer-- but he wasn't the best. We should be taking advice from blokes like Kerouac, Steinbeck, Hemingway, or Vonnegut.
      • xsuite, on 01/26/2008, -1/+10But of course literary appreciation is subjective. I dont expect everyone to feel the same way I do.
      • gudnbluts, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3Kerouac? I take it you're joking.
        • Carthagefield, on 01/27/2008, -0/+2Apparently, for xsuite only American authors can cut the mustard. The likes of Orwell offends his patriotic sensibilities.
    • CoolWind, on 01/26/2008, -3/+2"Never use a long word where a short one will do." bah. Always use the most precise word.
      "Long words don’t make you sound intelligent unless used skillfully." It seems he was more worried about his image than about accurately conveying his meaning.
      • Swift2, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3Of course. But prefer the short word "when it will do."
        The problem with "long words" in English is very simple. The short words are direct and Anglo-Saxon. A cow is a cow. Long words were created by the Norman conquerors, by the elites, educated or not, the clergy, and so on. Sometimes those words are there to be precisely meaningful, and sometimes they're there to mystify, as you would expect from an occupier or their slavish elites and servile clergy and so on: that's where the principle is that a single-syllable is never as good as a word with many syllables constructed from the dead language, Latin, because the people don't understand it.
        • CoolWind, on 01/26/2008, -0/+1Sometimes a meaning can be conveyed precisely by only 1 word. It would be dumb to use a different word for the sake of following one of Orwell's 'rules'.
          • edwartica, on 01/27/2008, -0/+2No writer worth their salt will follow the rules just for the sake of following the rules. If the rules don't work, then in that instance, the rules are wrong. I am sure Orwell would of agreed with me as well.
      • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3He seems to of conveyed his meaning quite well in his writings. How many people quote 1984? How many people get the allegory of Animal farm? Most.
    • darkciti2, on 01/27/2008, -1/+4Two perfect examples of vocabulary infection:
      "Jumped the shark"
      and
      "after the jump"

      The latter (after the jump), is being introduced so that television networks know where to insert the commercials when they bootleg our content - by copying our blogs and inserting their ads as they take digg to the masses.

      Jumped the shark is a British English phrase, but I'm not sure why it's showing up on so many US based blogs, etc. (I have nothing against it, I just don't understand why it's become so prevalent so quickly).
  • Error601, on 01/26/2008, -11/+5Yea, I remember talking about those rules in an 11th grade writing class. I thought they were from the Strunk and White book though: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elements_of_Style
  • Plotinus, on 01/26/2008, -2/+41the rules actually come from the Orwell essay: "Politics and the English Language" published in 1946

    http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm

    It's a damned good essay all the way through, very thought provoking and fully applicable today.
    • Swift2, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3Agreed about Orwell. If we had had his appreciation of political speech, we would not be in Iraq. People talk about "the intelligence," but all you really had to have in 2002 was a knowledge of the way meaning in conveyed, how lies are told, and a good ***** detector.
      • Jambi, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3And a great many of us (both conservative and liberal) saw through this utter ***** and were insulted for our trouble by the majority when we spoke up.
    • EdwardsNH, on 01/27/2008, -0/+3It is a good essay, but my favorite is still "Shooting an Elephant".

      http://www.online-literature.com/orwell/887/
  • DrPaulFTW, on 01/26/2008, -13/+3Digg is taking down anything dealing with Scientology! Is that Orwellian enough for you!?
    • FunkyWitDaSysTm, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3wrong, idiot:

      http://digg.com/search?section=all&s=scientology
    • SuperMoses, on 01/26/2008, -0/+5When Orwell wrote of 3 world powers dominating the world, oppressing it's people, watching over every move they do, rewriting history, deleting people out of existence, and mind control... he wasn't talking about Digg or anything like Digg.
      • Swift2, on 01/26/2008, -3/+2Maybe he was talking about "a long war" against Islamofascists who don't control any state, but are all powerful -- like... Goldstein! I hate Goldstein! What a monster he is!
    • CoolWind, on 01/26/2008, -5/+1Good for digg. Let the rabid anti-scientology cult find a new outlet for their hatred.
      reported as offensive.
    • sarixe, on 01/26/2008, -0/+1*points DrPaulFTW's finger in the right direction*
      Digg is only reporting. Anonymous are the ones doing it.
  • LincolnA, on 01/26/2008, -13/+3Wtf, how is this front-paged with 39 diggs?
  • Soulbow2, on 01/26/2008, -4/+5Why didn't I see this before I took my SAT this morning?
    • chrislooft, on 01/26/2008, -0/+10SAT writing is nonsense. They ignore originality and style but award major points for a 3-part thesis and 5 paragraphs.
      • sgtbutterscotch, on 01/26/2008, -0/+6I had an SAT tutor who taught me that in the intro, the last sentence should be something like: "This essay will further discuss ____, ______, and ____. But in school, I was taught to never have a sentence such as that, as it is insulting to the reader who can figure what the essay is about to himself.
        • Genevera, on 01/27/2008, -0/+4I had a similar experience. In high school, we were taught to avoid sentences such as "This essay is about..." or "I will be discussing..." at all costs. Don't say you're going to write about something, just write it.

          Maybe your tutor thought it would be easier to grade that way? I don't know. Whatever the reasoning, it doesn't sound like very good advice to me.
      • sarixe, on 01/26/2008, -1/+10Remember, SAT isn't testing how smart you are. It's testing how well you can take the SAT.
        • nomadofthehills, on 01/26/2008, -3/+3But if you are smart, you will ace it.
          • sarixe, on 01/27/2008, -0/+4True, but you don't have to be smart to ace it. That is a problem.
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+4If you're taking the SATs, you should of already read at least one Orwell novel. Isn't Animal Farm supposed to be standard reading for 11th grade?
      • nomadofthehills, on 01/26/2008, -2/+2SAT?

        ACT all the way.
      • bokononrock, on 01/26/2008, -1/+5And you should *have* learned that "should of" is an annoying malapropism.
      • nigh7dagger, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1Animal Farm was 9th grade for me. 11th is Scarlet Letter and Great Gatsby
        • tchynerd, on 01/27/2008, -0/+3Fast food Nation, the Demon in the Freezer, Brave New World and 1984 FTW
          :-) Gotta Love (11th Grade) AP Lang!
          • edwartica, on 01/27/2008, -0/+3They let you read Fast Food Nation! MAN! We had to read Walden! Then I had to read Walden three times in college. I wish Emerson was still alive so I can beat him up for lending Theroau the use of that damned cabin!
        • daza, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1I didn't enjoy Great Gatsby.. :(, however Brave New World is probably one of my favourite novels I've had to read and critique at school.
  • silentcollision, on 01/26/2008, -0/+31Dugg for being one of the greatest writers ever. If you haven't already, read Nineteen Eighty-Four.
    • santaliqueur, on 01/26/2008, -2/+9In before the "why read it when you are living it" comment.
      • Soulbow2, on 01/26/2008, -8/+1Not quite yet. North Korea is already there though and America is well on the way.
    • notque, on 01/26/2008, -0/+2And Homage to Catalonia
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3And then read Huxley's "Brave New World." Its wonderful to compare and contrast the two dystopias.
      • brainster31, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3and let me just say for the record that if i had to choose I'd take Huxley's
        • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+5Oh yes! Consumerism and promiscuity encouraged! Everyone seems to be happy! And if you're not, you get shipped to Iceland to hang out with the greatest minds on the planet!
          The only ones who wouldn't be happy are the upper directors and maybe the people on the reservations.
        • tchynerd, on 01/27/2008, -0/+2Seems to Me like we may end up between the 2. All the fun of classism no of the fun of Soma :(
    • sherbertbones, on 01/26/2008, -0/+11And Shooting an Elephant, study that...it helped me edit my essays from B's to A's.
    • Error601, on 01/27/2008, -1/+4No one on the Internet has read 1984 considering how often it's incorrectly referenced. They only saw the movie if that.
    • moletimer, on 01/27/2008, -0/+5And Animal Farm.
    • bosssmiley, on 01/27/2008, -0/+4Aw hell, read *any and all* Orwell you can get your hands on. The man couldn't write a bad sentence to win a bet, and he spoke more sense than almost anyone I can think of.
    • darkciti2, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1If you're not a reader, at least RENT the movie 1984. At least it will get the message across (to the non-book types). I haven't read or seen Animal Farm yet, but I'm going to go check it out now.

      As for "Brave New World", I haven't read / listened to it yet, but it always queues up on my ipod when I'm mowing the lawn (after my Public Enemy playlist ends - which is great for fighting landscape, BTW)
      • edwartica, on 01/27/2008, -0/+3I have not seen the movie, but 1984 is a REALLY easy read. You'll get through it pretty quickly. Same goes for Animal Farm.
  • IvanB, on 01/26/2008, -3/+18This has been on the frontpage countless of times. I remember submitting it around a year ago and getting blamed it was dupe, meh..
    Still a good read. :)
    • masterm1nd, on 01/26/2008, -0/+1dupe comment
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+4Its a classic though. Orwell was one of the best writer's of the 20th century. Would you complain if your local theater troupe did Hamlet more than once?
  • K3ITHK, on 01/26/2008, -1/+2Looks like 6 from here.
  • Snyz, on 01/26/2008, -1/+1There are far too many people on the internet who break the second rule.
  • rkef, on 01/26/2008, -5/+29"When Hemingway was criticized by Faulkner for ..."

    Why not: "When Faulkner criticized Hemingway for ..."? ***** hypocrite.
    • Locke23, on 01/26/2008, -0/+9Lmao. Nice find.
    • whahaa, on 01/26/2008, -3/+18it saves a confusing pronoun.

      "When Hemingway was criticized by Faulkner for his limited word choice he replied,"

      the sentence is about hemingway replying, not about him being criticized. if you used the construction you suggested it would be less clear:

      "When Faulkner criticized Hemingway for his limited word choice he replied,"

      see? it sounds like Faulkner is the one that's replying, which is not correct.
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -1/+4"Although I’ve edited this piece a dozen times I’m sure it contains imperfections."
      Well, at least he admits he breaks his own rules intentionally, and unintentionally.
    • sarixe, on 01/26/2008, -1/+4Well, at least there was an apology made by the author for any mistakes that might not have been found by him.
    • kingfelix, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1Orwell was just repeating what he'd heard from other prescriptive grammarians before him, without really understanding the implications. The following is a comment on his own use of the passive from Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage (1994), p. 720:

      "Orwell's essay is interesting in another regard. Bryant 1962 reports three statistical studies of passive versus active sentences in various periodicals; the highest incidence of passive constructions was 13 percent. Orwell runs to a little over 20 percent in 'Politics and the English Language.' Clearly he found the construction useful in spite of his advice to avoid it as much as possible. There is general agreement that the passive is useful when the receiver of the action is more important that the doer..."

      For more, see
      http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/%7Emyl/languagelog/archi ...
  • Rev0lver, on 01/26/2008, -6/+2Excellent advice from one of the greatest writers of the past century.
  • whatthefu, on 01/26/2008, -3/+5It's kind of silly that the author of the blog had to explain each rule for us.
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3You have never taken any upper level literary criticism course, have you? Lucky you btw. I still have nightmares of my literary criticism of the 17th and 18th centuries.
      • bosssmiley, on 01/27/2008, -0/+4You poor soul.
        Please accept my profound sympathies for what this will have done to your simple enjoyment of many a good book. I hope one day you can look upon works from those days without grinding your teeth.
        (dropped Lit Crit at uni after 1 semester)
        • edwartica, on 01/27/2008, -0/+2Luckily I only had to take two classes on literary critcism itself. The rest were writing and/or general lit classes (lit of the romantics, poetry, shakespeare, early american lit....) so it didn't poison me too much. :)
  • masterm1nd, on 01/26/2008, -2/+2So if he would have taken his own advise to the maximum extreme, it would be one rule. Dumb it down.
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -1/+2That would mean going against the spirit of rule number three: "If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out."
      The key phrase in that rule is "If it is possible." In this case, I don't believe it is possible. "Dumb it down" might be the thesis (though I might have issue with that being Orwell's thesis) but I assure you, Orwell's point would not of come across right if he had not included all six rules. Think of them as bullet points.
    • brainster31, on 01/26/2008, -1/+3thats not quite right simple does not mean stupid, look at Hemingway
  • Locke23, on 01/26/2008, -2/+3Thank you, thank you, thank you. Orwell is one of my favorites, and as a indie writer, this WILL come in handy.
  • SabrinaHeaven, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3I don't know if I buy that argument about the relative emotional impact of cliché.

    The important point to get out of that essay by Orwell is that you should write what you mean and choose specific words for their specific meanings.
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -1/+2It would depend on your audience. If you were talking to a room full of lit professors, I can assure you that the rule would (ahem) hold its salt.
    • nomadofthehills, on 01/26/2008, -3/+2What would Orwell know about writing?
  • JohnnyKdiggs, on 01/26/2008, -2/+4From the same essay:
    "Political language...is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable"

    It's like he knew Bush!
    • masterm1nd, on 01/26/2008, -1/+5It's like he put it in the essay to be a perfect Bush joke! It's like he knew you!
    • nigh7dagger, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1It's not JUST our fearless leader that says stuff like that. Look at most anything by a government agency or corporation.
  • hrvatski, on 01/26/2008, -3/+3The guy was a good author. However this list is and always has been a subjective pile of *****. Use the active instead of passive? Pfft.. that's to be laughed at.
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -1/+2Think of it like this. If you write something demanding action, its best that your tone is active, and not passive.
      You also must realize that passive voice is used as a default, thus it might indicate a lack of thought about style. And yes, I realize I use passive voice in that last sentence).
  • narcofiche, on 01/26/2008, -0/+2I don't know if I just fell victim to his '5 rules' magic, but I actually read that entire article. Dugg.
  • tsevis, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3Good advices. I agree with all 5 rules plus the 6the one, which describes exactly the free spirit of George Orwell.

    He is one of my favorite writers. It's sad that people only know two books of his (1984 and Animal Farm). He wrote some masterpieces one could enjoy, such as Keep the aspidistra flying, Days of Burma, In and Out in Paris and London...
    Happy to see this coming to the front page.
    • hrvatski, on 01/26/2008, -0/+1advice
    • indichik, on 01/26/2008, -0/+2I read Down and Out in Paris and London as a teenager and I still think sometimes, well, at least I'm doing better than Orwell in that book. Seriously, the stuff he went through as a virtual homeless person was nuts. We should take his advice just because of that.
      • tsevis, on 01/26/2008, -0/+1Happy to see another one who read it.
  • etement, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3"Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words? He thinks I don’t know the ten-dollar words. I know them all right. But there are older and simpler and better words, and those are the ones I use."
  • Swift2, on 01/26/2008, -5/+2Anybody notice there were 6 principles cited?
    • nomadofthehills, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3Good observational skills. /sarcasm
  • dkern, on 01/26/2008, -0/+2Those of us who lack formal education in institutions need all tips available. Thank you for posting.
  • shibatoman, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3can someone please show everyone at pitchforkmedia.com this???
    • MightyLime, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1Seriously, I don't think I've ever read an entire Pitchfork review because they're so overcooked. I always wonder how their writers can be bothered ruining everything they write like that, it must take so much more effort.
    • isayre020888, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1It's Pitchfork, of course they want to sound pretentious and arrogant.
  • Metasquares, on 01/26/2008, -0/+10"Accordingly, any words that don’t contribute meaning to a passage dilute its power. Less is always better. Always."

    *Except in a doctoral dissertation :) - how to write 150+ pages on what you could explain in 15.
  • philiaC, on 01/26/2008, -2/+2Rule 1: 1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

    Text in Rule 6: "The key is effort."

    Come on George.
    • Gwyddyon, on 01/27/2008, -0/+2This was written in 1946. What Orwell was used to seeing in print is not what we are used to, which is why most of his metaphor examples are outdated; they are either not used anymore or have passed out of the metaphor phase into standard usage. Perhaps he coined that term, which is now why we see it in print.
    • AdrewMc3, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1let quote Orwell in his own essay here "Look back through this essay, and for certain you will find that I have again and again committed the very faults I am protesting against." ...Also he didn't write the article your quoting...
  • HeyaBILL, on 01/26/2008, -0/+4"Long words don’t make you sound intelligent unless used skillfully. In the wrong situation they’ll have the opposite effect, making you sound pretentious and arrogant. They’re also less likely to be understood and more awkward to read."

    So true.
  • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+5These "rules" basically have one goal: To make one put extra thought into one's writings. Once one observes and examines these rules against their writing, then one can say "If the rules don't fit, then the rules are wrong."
    • edwartica, on 01/26/2008, -0/+4And above all....Know your audience!
  • mashw, on 01/26/2008, -0/+2I enjoy Orwell's plain-English style and on reflection some of the most memorable books I've read have been written in the same way, that being concise, clear and as simple as possible. Bertrand Russell seems to me to have been a master of this also, and authors like Cormac McCarthy I would say are continuing in the same vein.

    Great article.
  • Vodka2389, on 01/26/2008, -0/+3The problem with #'s 2 and 3 is that colleges almost always ask for minimal length, so everybody end up doing the exact opposite.

    It needs to change.
    • krackajap, on 01/26/2008, -0/+1Yes, it's a rather hypocritical rule. It usually just ends with students fluffing up their essay and repeating things multiple times which ends up weakening the essay. I've been lucky enough to have had teachers that generally overlook the minimum length requirement if the essay is solid.
  • SLH06, on 01/26/2008, -4/+2I believe the only reason why this style is so successful is because our comprehension level of english has gone down drastically since the 1700's hundreds. Vocabulary wise we are idiots compared the authors of then.
  • Dorepoll, on 01/27/2008, -0/+2He was a really big W. Somerset Maughan fan, which explains his love for careful to the point wording.
  • sadenshi, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1Awesome.
  • Greenergrass, on 01/27/2008, -0/+0I already have read these rules a few months ago... they are obvious when we read them and I try to keep them in mind as much as I can when I write poetry. Being clear, concise and still oneself with smart talent is the best. I should read his essay, thanks to remind me that... again.
  • AaronSaund, on 01/27/2008, -1/+2It's called K.I.S.S. Keep it simple stupid. Learned it in high school...
  • shovelihave, on 01/27/2008, -0/+3War is Peace
    Freedom is Slavery
    Ignorance is Strength

    yes I know them by heart
  • imiJnation, on 01/27/2008, -0/+1The comment to number 4 should read "We break this one frequently..."
    Okay, Okay, I promise not to be a grammar Nazi. I promise not to be a grammar Nazi.
    But number 4 is about NEVER using the passive...
    I promise not to be a grammar Nazi. I promise not to be a grammar Nazi.
    Go ahead digg me down.
  • lilb518, on 01/27/2008, -2/+0If you ever read the entire essay you'll notice that he breaks every rule
  •  

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