Rudolf Flesch's Rules: 25 Tips for Powerful Writing

The Book: How to Write, Speak and Think More Effectively ^ | 1/24/2017 | Rudolph Flesch

[Dan Baker]

As a FReeper, you're no doubt someone who strives to communicate with a certain degree of flair and influence.

In fact, one of the excellent things I find about Free Republic is it's a great on-line sandbox for sharpening your writing style and matching wits with other FReepers.

Now, as an independent analyst in the telecom industry, I write a lot, so I've always admired the writing style in well-edited journals, such as Fortune, Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times.

So the question becomes: how can I best learn and adopt the clear and interesting writing techniques of the best commentators and journalists out there?

Well, a few years ago I ran across an invaluable series of books written by a guy named Rudolf Flesch, and reading his works has given me much solid professional advice over the years.

Rudolf Franz Flesch (1911 — 1986) was an Austrian-born naturalized American author, and also a readability expert and writing consultant who was a vigorous proponent of plain English.

Flesch consulted with magazine publishers and authored many books for the layman on how to write & communicate.  The practical writing principles (and rules) he taught are the same ones employed by large and successful media publishers from the 1950s to today. Toward the end of his career, Flesch compiled and synthesized his knowledge in: How to Write, Speak and Think More Effectively.  This book is a extremely dense with advice, but is also a highly readable collection of his life's teaching. It believe it's the finest book of advice in non-fiction writing you'll find anywhere. The book is out of print, but you can find used copies of the book on Amazon.

Now to help embed Flesch's writing rules in my own head, I compiled and condensed many of Flesch's key writing tips into the 25 rules and visuals below.  I added slightly to Flesch's points, figuring he'd want to update a few things given that our visual and hyperlink options have exploded in the internet age.

Hope you find the list useful.  I'm look for some advice on ways to distribute this knowledge to a wider audience.  Here are some questions I have:

• What format(s) would be most useful to you?  I'm trying to design a quick reference card -- something like that.
• How should I best distribute this content, say, to kids in high school?  How would you teach it?
• If I created some software that analyzed a text according to these rules, how valuable would that be?  What would you expect people to pay for that?

Thanks, Dan Baker — dbaker_ at _technology-research.com

1. Abbreviate where you can.
2. Active voice is better than passive.
3. Articles, conjunctions & prepositions (reduce).
4. Commas (reduce them).
5. Contractions are good.
6. Cut needless words.
7. Dialogue often.
8. Factor expressions
9. First person singular (use).
10. Help the reader read.
11. Numbers in the text.
12. Parentheses (use them).
13. Personal sentences & words.
14. Punctuate to reduce words.
15. Pronouns (use to shorten names)
16. Question marks add interest.
17. Readers (remember them).
18. References & links in the text.
19. Shorten sentences & paragraphs
20. Simple words are preferred.
21. Specify things to boost interest.
22. Symbols in the text.
23. Underline for emphasis.
24. Verbs (choose them over nouns).
25. Visuals ( use to create interest).

 

	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top
	top

[ClearCase_guy]

It was a dark and stormy night ...

[Vendome]

No All Caps?..

Ridiculous article..../s

[Menehune56]

Good stuff ping

[Dr. Sivana]

I know these are standard “rules” for “effective” writing, sometimes the passive voice is best employed.

[Pontiac]

Simple words are preferred.

I think this bit of advice has been carried to the extreme.

The NYT is written at a 9th grade level and the USA Today is written for a 7th grader.

Even the WSJ is only written for a high school senior. Who is writing for adults?

[Nifster]

meh

This has led to a lot of the crapola dumbed down writing of the advertising age.

Struck and White is still my go to

[Billthedrill]

Good advice, most of it. Taken too far one risks falling into chatspeak cant. "U", for example, is not preferable to "You" in the interest of concision.

Neither. Are sentence. Fragments.

[TChad]

Not bad.

[Bob]

Is it OK to occasionally split an infinitive? :=)

[ctdonath2]

“It was a dark and stormy night ...”

http://www.bulwer-lytton.com

You’re welcome.

[PLMerite]

Active voice: “I’m gonna kick your ASS!”

[ctdonath2]

Go read Stephen King’s “On Writing”, chapter “Toolbox”.

[Responsibility2nd]

Bumpity bump.

[hole_n_one]

This will have me right reel good and my words will sore with knew stuff.

[dfwgator]

Omit needless words.

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

Bookmark.

[Cedar]

Too many rules! Just say what you want to say! :)

[Redcitizen]

Tip #26- Post a reply without reading the article.

[Nifster]

Write for third graders