From the Archives: Deb Vanasse on Le Mot Juste

“Vigorous writing is concise.”

~William Strunk Jr.

What’s the oldest book about writing that’s still on your shelves? Mine is Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style, the third edition (it’s now in it’s fourth). The cover price (new) of $2.75 gives you some idea of how long I’ve owned it. 

“No book in shorter space, with fewer words, will help any writer more than this persistent little volume,” says The Boston Globe. “The work remains a nonpareil: direct, correct, and delightful,” says The New Yorker.

The Elements of Style is a model of precision. Will Strunk was E. B. White’s composition professor at Cornell way back in 1919. White put his professor’s advice to good use, becoming a successful author (to say the least) in his own right. In 1957, Macmillan commissioned White to revise Strunk’s edicts on style.

And edicts they are. “Professor Strunk was a positive man,” White says in his introduction to the third edition, putting a nice spin on it. “His book contains rules of grammar phrased as direct orders. In the main I have not tried to soften his commands, or modify his pronouncements, or remove the special objects of his scorn.”

When I taught college composition, I used The Elements of Style as a textbook. Among the advice I hoped it would impart to my students:

Never mind that this list includes a few contradictions (as in “Do not overstate” but also “Put statements in positive form”). I took Strunk and White’s call to heart in my own writing, and though as a more mature writer I now qualify some of the advice (“Do not affect a breezy manner,” “Do not inject opinion,” “Use figures of speech sparingly,” “Prefer the standard to the offbeat”) in favor of strong voice, I’m still glad I learned first and foremost to write with precision.

Yes, rules are restrictive, but we must know language, the tool of our trade, and precision tempered with feeling yields beauty. Of course, it’s also possible to take precision a little too far. Known to deliberate for weeks over a single word, nineteenth-century novelist Gustave Flaubert championed le mot juste. I’ve read Flaubert’s Madame Bovary in both English and French, and while it’s a finely crafted novel, there are several that have made a much bigger impression. An emphasis on micro-editing over larger concerns like character motivation and emotional resonance can yield micro-results.

Check This Out: These days you’ll dish out (apologies, Misters Strunk and White, for the breezy manner) more than $2.75, but if you don’t own a copy of The Elements of Style, you’re missing out on some of the most precise advice ever offered up to writers.

Try This: For help with precision, Smart Edit is a free program for Windows that points out clichés as well as overused words and phrases. I haven’t tried it yet; if you do, leave a comment to let me know what you think. 

Deb cross-posts at www.selfmadewriter.blogspot.com.