Writing

Miscellaneous

On September 7th, 1982, Ogilvy sent the following internal memo to all agency employees, titled “How to Write” and found in the 1986 gem The Unpublished David Ogilvy (public library).

The better you write, the higher you go in Ogilvy & Mather. People who think well, write well.

1. Read the Roman-Raphaelson book on writing. Read it three times.

1. Write the way you talk. Naturally. [I will add: aspire to this, sort of. Try to talk the way you write. Most peopel cant talk either, becuase yhey don't think. ]

1. Use short words, short sentences and short paragraphs.
2. Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass.
3. Never write more than two pages on any subject. [???]
4. Check your quotations.
5. Never send a letter or a memo on the day you write it. Read it aloud the next morning — and then edit it.
6. If it is something important, get a colleague to improve it.
7. Before you send your letter or your memo, make sure it is crystal clear what you want the recipient to do.
8. If you want ACTION, don’t write. Go and tell the guy what you want.

https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/02/07/david-ogilvy-on-writing/

Books and Essays and Advice

• [https://www.brainpickings.org/2013/05/03/advice-on-writing/ "Timeless Advice on Writing: The Collected Wisdom of Great Writers

Hemingway, Didion, Baldwin, Fitzgerald, Sontag, Vonnegut, Bradbury, Morrison, Orwell, Le Guin, Woolf, and other titans of literature."]

• https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/02/07/david-ogilvy-on-writing/

Valedictions

"Yours, etc." is a great idea for special uses, combining pomposity with just a touch of rude condescension.

https://twitter.com/yuanyi_z/status/1357074400357601281 and https://twitter.com/LawDavF/status/1356939762574196739

Valedictions are a big problem. We desperately need a convention, especially for emails and phone text messages. We need them as "Over and out" signs.
I unhappily use YT (short for "Yours Truly") and IHS. IHS can mean "In His Service", "In Hoc Signo Vinces", or the Christogram---see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christogram#IHS.
I like triple entendre..
As an economist, it feels good to make words work triple overtime.

Just signed off 'yours faithfully' on a formal email to unnamed person because I was taught at school to do that and leave 'yours sincerely' for known person.

I was taught it the other way around. The logic being: You can be sincere to anybody, but you can only be faithful to somebody you know.

40 years old & was taught this at school - I was told you couldn’t be sincere to someone whose name you didn’t know. While the French ‘Cordialement’ is easy for emails, the formal structures for ending a letter in French are far more complex than Yours F/S.

I was taught the no ‘s’ rule: you can’t use ‘sir’ and ‘sincerely’. So, to Dr Jones I’d sign off with ‘Yours sincerely’ but to Sir, Madam, or Whom it may concern you’d get ‘Yours faithfully’.

I sign my emails off 'with kindest regards' for the lovely people, 'kind regards' for just normal and 'regards' to let somebody know I am incandescent with rage with them

Names in salutations are a problem. I'm 62, and well-known within economics. When should I use (1)"Dear Mr. Smith", when (2) "Dear John (if I may)" and when (3)"Dear John"?

I use (1) for old non-economists; (2) for old economists, even if Nobelworthy; (3) for juniors.

“Stay safe” is the new “Regards” anything else then you are a dinosaur !

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EtVP4qKXEAECXP_?format=jpg&name=large

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Writer's Block

Don't overthink it.

Until after the first draft.

Then think it over.

And over and over and over.

And over.

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