The minute you read something that you can t understand, you can almost be sure it was drawn up by a lawyer. Will Rogers

The minute you read something that you can t understand, you can almost be sure it was drawn up by a lawyer. Will Rogers

The writer is under pressure to take shortcuts. This has become the normal environment of most legal writing, and is one of the principal reasons why so much of it is so bad. --David Mellinkoff, Legal Writing: Sense and Nonsense

There are two things wrong with almost all legal writing. One is its style. The other is its content. FRED RODELL

A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people. -- THOMAS MANN

The pen is the tongue of the mind. CERVANTES

There is no rule on how to write. Sometimes it comes easily; and perfectly; sometimes it s like drilling rock and then blasting it out with charges. ERNEST HEMINGWAY

Words so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them. NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

The desire to write grows with writing. DESIDERIUS ERASMUS

Precise language mirrors clear thought. EUGENE C. GERHART

A sentence gets its force from short words. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, JR.

A good writer writes with a thesaurus and a dictionary at his elbow. Elliott L. Biskind Legal Writing Simplified

[T]he value of adjectives and adverbs is in inverse ratio to the frequency of their use. Elliott L. Biskind Legal Writing Simplified

The road to hell is paved with adverbs. STEPHEN KING

The adjective is the enemy of the noun. VOLTAIRE

When you catch an adjective, kill it. --MARK TWAIN

The structure of every sentence is a lesson in logic. JOHN STUART MILL

There is no such thing as good writing. There is only good rewriting. JUSTICE LOUIS BRANDEIS SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Let the reader find that he cannot afford to omit any line of your writing because you have omitted every word that he can spare. --RALPH WALDO EMERSON

The most important lesson in the writing trade is that any manuscript is improved if you cut away the fat. ROBERT HEINLEIN

No passion in the world is equal to the passion to alter someone else's draft. H.G. WELLS

"I leave out the parts that people skip. ELMORE LEONARD

Habit can be a built-in obstruction to consistently good style, notwithstanding editing and rewriting. Elliott L. Biskind Legal Writing Simplified

bee care full win yew ewes spell checque:?. PAMELA PANTSUIT

And/or is best discarded. --J.K. Aitken, Piesse s The Elements of Drafting

With experience you ll find that you don t need and/or. Bryan A. Garner, Legal Writing in Plain English

If the lawyers did invent and/or, they owe it to the common language to atone, by eliminating and/or from the legal vocabulary.... David Mellinkoff, Legal Writing: Sense and Nonsense

The minute you read something that you can t understand, you can almost be sure it was drawn up by a lawyer. Will Rogers

The common language of the law is not the product of necessity, precedent, convention, or economy, but it is the product of sloth, confusion, hurry, cowardice, ignorance, neglect, and cultural poverty. JUDGE LYNN N. HUGHES U.S. DISTRICT COURT, HOUSTON, TEXAS.

There are two things wrong with almost all legal writing. One is its style. The other is its content. FRED RODELL

A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus: 1. What am I trying to say? 2. What words will express it? 3. What image or idiom will make it clearer? 4. Is this image fresh enough to have an effect? And he will probably ask himself two more: 1. Could I put it more shortly? 2. Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly? GEORGE ORWELL Politics and the English Language:

The essence of writing is to know your subject. - David McCullough

Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind. RUDYARD KIPLING

He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know. - Abraham Lincoln

There are two things wrong with almost all legal writing. One is its style. The other is its content. FRED RODELL

Precise language mirrors clear thought. EUGENE C. GERHART

Have something to say, and say it as clearly as you can. That is the only secret of style. --MATTHEW ARNOLD

The chief virtue that language can have is clarity. HIPPOCRATES (460-377 BC)

Everything that can be thought at all can be thought clearly. Everything that can be said can be said clearly. LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN

Good prose should be transparent, like a window pane. GEORGE ORWELL

The biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has been accomplished. GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

Think like a wise man but communicate in the language of the people. WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

Precise language mirrors clear thought. EUGENE C. GERHART

Cut out all these exclamation points. An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke. F. SCOTT FITZGERALD

I hate commas in the wrong places. WALT WHITMAN

The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do. THOMAS JEFFERSON

Be direct, simple, brief, vigorous, and lucid. H.W. FOWLER

This report, by its very length, defends itself against the risk of being read. - SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL

The shorter and the plainer the better. BEATRIX POTTER

What is above all needed is to let the meaning choose the word, and not the other way around. In prose, the worst thing one can do with words is surrender to them. -- George Orwell Politics and the English Language

The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter it s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning. --MARK TWAIN

The finest language is mostly made up of simple unimposing words. GEORGE ELIOT (MARY ANNE EVANS)

Use the smallest word that does the job. E.B. WHITE

One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple. JACK KEROUAC

I like good strong words that mean something. - LOUISA MAY ALCOTT

Be direct, simple, brief, vigorous, and lucid. H.W. FOWLER

Broadly speaking, the short words are the best, and the old words when short are best of all. WINSTON CHURCHILL

The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do. THOMAS JEFFERSON

The shorter and the plainer the better. BEATRIX POTTER

Be direct, simple, brief, vigorous, and lucid. H.W. FOWLER

The best writing has no lace on its sleeves. WALT WHITMAN

Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. ALBERT EINSTEIN

What is above all needed is to let the meaning choose the word, and not the other way around. In prose, the worst thing one can do with words is surrender to them. -- George Orwell Politics and the English Language