You can solve most of your writing problems if you stop after every sentence and ask: what does the reader need to know next?
Interpretation
Focus on the reader's needs to improve your writing.
The quote emphasizes the importance of understanding the perspective of the reader when writing. By pausing after each sentence to consider what information would be most beneficial for the reader, a writer can create clearer and more engaging content that effectively communicates their message.
In practice
A writing workshop where participants discuss the importance of considering the reader.
Writing is hard work. A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first time, or even the third time. Remember this in moments of despair. If you find that writing is hard, it's because it is hard. It's one of the hardest things that people do
Never hesitate to imitate another writer. Imitation is part of the creative process for anyone learning an art or a craft. Bach and Picasso didn't spring full-blown as Bach or Picasso; they needed models. This is especially true of writing.
Good writing is lean and confident.
My four articles of faith: clarity, simplicity, brevity and humanity.
I have no interest in teaching writers how to sell. I want to teach them how to write. If the process is sound, the product will take care of itself, and sales are likely to follow.
Don't hedge your prose with little timidities. Good writing is lean and confident. . . . Every little qualifier whittles away some fraction of the reader's trust. Readers want a writer who believes in himself and in what he is saying. Don't diminish that belief. Don't be kind of bold. Be bold.
People are born with intrinsic motivation, self-esteem, dignity, curiosity to learn, joy in learning.
Some children may need a behavioral approach, whereas other children may need a sensory approach.
When I was growing up, my parents told me, 'Finish your dinner. People in China and India are starving.' I tell my daughters, 'Finish your homework. People in India and China are starving for your job.'
The student is half afraid to meet one of the great philosophers face to face. He feels himself inadequate and thinks he will not understand him. But if he only knew, the great man, just because of his greatness, is much more intelligible than his modern commentator. The simplest student will be able to understand, if not all, yet a very great deal of what Plato said; but hardly anyone can understand some modern books on Platonism.
I am fascinated by language in daily life: the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth.
All too rarely do I hear people asking just what it is that we've done to make so many children's hearts so hard, or what collectively we might do to right their moral compass - what values we must live by.
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