Henry Watson Fowler Quotes

It need hardly be said that shortness is a merit in words.

Be direct, simple, brief, vigorous, and lucid.

Any one who wishes to become a good writer should endeavour, before he allows himself to be tempted by the more showy qualities, to be direct, simple, brief, vigorous, and lucid.

Prefer the familiar word to the far-fetched. Prefer the concrete word to the abstract. Prefer the single word to the circumlocution. Prefer the short word to the long. Prefer the Saxon word to the Romance.

After all, it is an ancient and valuable right of the English people to turn their nouns into verbs when they are so minded.

Those who run to long words are mainly the unskillful and tasteless; they confuse pomposity with dignity, flaccidity with ease, and bulk with force.

The obvious is better than obvious avoidance of it.

Those who are addicted to the phrase “to use a vulgarism” expect to achieve the feat of being at once vulgar and superior to vulgarity.

Anyone who finds himself putting down several commas close to one another should reflect that he is making himself disagreeable.

The writer’s Queen Victoria is his public, and he would do well to keep a bust of the old Queen on his desk with the legend “We are not amused” hanging from it.