The Washington times., 1923-01-08
How Would YOU Write This?
A Lesson in Expressing Ideas for Our Young People

= A Lesson Expressing Ideas for Our Young People.
TO write well u.s. first to HAVE good idea and then know
bow get the idea from your head into another mans head
simply easily without waste Of words and without effort
the part of the who reads
The making YOUR thought plain and clear to others
3 highly important-not only to the writer but to every
human being
The clerk is good clerk when he can put his idea easily
into the mind of customer s
good get her thoughts the goodness of her
ksart, easily into the minds Of her children.
making yourself clear in speech writing and
easily understood is like other art ONE THAT MUST
BIZ PRACTICED.
today boys high school and the
older who wish that they at high school LEARNING
We take from advertisement Of the works Of
Rudyard Kplng by Edmund Gosse
well known writer Here it is Read it quickly without
stopping and you understand Immediately just what the
writer meant:
mot fewer distinguished men of letters profess to have
discovered Kpling cities of old in which
Homer born Yet in fact the discovery not much
creditabe them than would be, night
% contrive notice comet flying the sky"
That intended very simple statement to be
INSTANTLY absorbed by the reading mind But IS it such
statement?
Take your pencil and paper for yourself just
much better how much simply how much briefly
Y0U the thought that Edmund Gose tried to get
from his mind into your mind.
This good chance for readers to practice the art Of e
pressing simple thought simply For the idea is to make
simple striking COMPARISON
Imagination spontaneously expresses thought
81 apt comparison is the good imagination
The writing quoted above is bad because begins with the
word NOT You will feel instnctivey that to begin by
saying NOT is something like Harvesting horse with his
against the dashboard
viii dragging in of of cities
IN which Homer supposed to have been born checks the
thought that the writer wanted to express and makes the
reader stumble and hesitate instead of getting the idea into his
mind IMMEDIATELY.
give you this quotation the Rudyard Kipng ad
yersement not in spirit Of silly criticism but with desire
20 have good many young men PRACTICE THOUGHT and
oppression.
Write out yourself way which YOU could
express the idea that Edmund Gosse wishes to convey
& he might have said for example,:
The critics who say they discovered Kipng ricu
us the hoptoad the railroad who said he dis
covered the approaching locomotive headlight"
Or he might say:
When the lighthouse keeper the light across the
the little fish says I have discovered the lighthouse
That fish is the critic who said have discovered Kpng
Or could compare the little unimportant critic who
covers the great writer to the beetles moths and other
tiny flying creatures of the night that flock and discover
the electric light Except for that light THEY would be
invisible And except for the light of that which they crcse
the critics, a rule would be invisible.
Many critic who discovers great man is simply
obscure little futerng moth lighted for moment made
visible by the light that the great casts him.
The human has practiced almost everything EXCEPT
THINKING.
Thinking and writing speaking go together There
real thought that not expressed in words You
think EXCEPT IN WORDS. Try it.
The animals cannot THINK, they only feel because
y possess language with which express and formulate
thought
Men deal with each other convince other by thought
and through the expression of thought in words.
The who think well and his thoughts well
md simply and find SHORT, EASY ROAD TO THE MIND
OF THE OTHER MAN is the man who succeeds
PRACTICE THOUGHT AND THE WRITING AND
SPEAKING OF YOUR THOUGHT