Example research essay topic: Six Rules To Successful Writing - 714 words

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Orwell's six rules to successful writing What questions does an author ask himself when he sits down to write? George Orwell's views on politics and the English language explains what should be going through your mind as you write. You should be thinking six questions as you write and when you finish and read it over you should be editing with six more questions in order to be successful. Orwell follows his own rules closely as seen in 1984. These rules have made him a successful writer in our time. "Most prose has become vague and incompetent. " Words are no longer chosen for their meaning but for their lack of meaning. When an author set out to write he should be thinking of these six questions.

What am I trying to say? What words will express it? What image or idiom will make it clearer? Is this image fresh enough to have an effect? Could I put it more shortly?

Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly? Letting the meaning choose the word is a much more effective way to say exactly what you mean. "For several seconds he was too stunned to even throw the incriminating thing into the memory hole, " Said Wilson after receiving the love note from Julia. He found out for the first time that Julia was on his side. The incriminating evidence that she was committing a though crime and it lie in his hands awaiting him judgement. The memory hole being the place where all evidence burned.

All memory is lost in this hole. A good example of allowing the meaning to choose the words. A successful example of letting you know what he is trying to say. Short yet very expressive.

Phraseology is to name things without calling up mental pictures of them. However, the enemy of clear language is insincerity. In order to avoid insincerity you should follow the six rules for writing well. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figures of speech, which you are used to seeing in print. Never use a long word where a short one will do. If it is possible to cut out a word always cut it out.

Never use the passive where you can use the active. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or jargon if you can think of an everyday equivalent. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything barbarous. This means that you should follow these rules unless you absolutely have to. Even then, make sure it is the only way out of making you sound barbaric.

Orwell does not use any real metaphors or similes. He uses the active and the passive but only where needed. What makes him successful is that he sets his own rules and follows them. He creates a limit and sticks to it.

That may limit the multitude of confusing words. Leaving it open to more meaning and interpretation and yet he still says exactly what it should mean with as few simple words as possible. 1984 was an easy book to read however, it went a little more in depth. When he tells you in the beginning that, "war is peace, freedom is slavery and ignorance is strength", those few words said so much for the rest of the book. Those words had more depth and meaning as you progressed. They showed irony and characteristics of foreshadowing. By showing that the proles had been given more freedom although they are supposedly enslaved they are ignorant and they are a lot stronger in will and in mind than the other castes.

What war really exists is to keep the peace with in. Has Orwell successful established what writing is all about and will it make you a better writer. It just might if you have the ability, vocabulary, and patience to follow these rules. The questions that are designed to help the writer become the reader and the editor, Can help you to understand what you are trying to say. Moreover, to say it clearly. He has used it himself and it has benefited him greatly.

So there must be some truth in his views over literature. "No amount of editing will distort the beauty of truly beautiful work" Ben Franklin. Bibliography:

Research essay sample on Six Rules To Successful Writing