Several Short Sentences About Writing
Verlyn Klinkenborg · 2012 · Creativity
13 min · 11 chaptersNarrated in your voice
Original summary · AI-drafted, human-published · added by Library
What it's about
Klinkenborg argues that most writing instruction gets the process backward: it treats writing as the transcription of thoughts already settled in the writer's mind, when in fact writing is how thinking happens. He attacks outlining, the five-paragraph essay, and dense subordinate-clause prose as habits that hide thought rather than sharpen it. Written almost entirely in short, isolated sentences, the book performs its own argument and reshaped how a generation of writing teachers approach the sentence as the true unit of craft.
Reading plan
Pick a finish date and Genius lays out the days — the plan shows today's target and keeps you honest.
Read together
Start a circle and share the code — everyone sees everyone's honest place in the book. Accountability, not leaderboards.
Who it's for
- Writers who sense their prose is competent but lifeless and want to know why - Teachers of composition looking for an alternative to outline-and-thesis pedagogy - Working writers revising a manuscript who need a method for cutting rather than polishing
What’s inside
- 1Writing Is Not Transcription1 min
The belief that you must know what you think before you write it down is what makes most prose lifeless, because it turns writing into secretarial work instead of an act of discovery.
- 2The Sentence Is the Unit of Attention1 min
Most writers never scrutinize individual sentences in isolation, which is why weak, evasive, or empty sentences survive undetected inside paragraphs that sound fine as a whole.
- 3School Teaches the Wrong Habits1 min
The five-paragraph essay and thesis-first outlining taught in most schools train writers to fill in a predetermined shape rather than to think, and this habit persists long after school ends.
- 4Abstraction Is a Sign You Haven't Looked Yet1 min
Vague, general language in a draft is not a style problem to be fixed with better word choice; it is evidence that the writer has not actually observed the thing being described.
- 5Subordination Often Disguises Unfinished Thought1 min
Long, grammatically complex sentences with multiple subordinate clauses are frequently a way of concealing gaps in reasoning rather than a sign of sophisticated thinking.
- 6Revision Means Re-Seeing, Not Polishing1 min
Real revision requires being willing to delete a passage entirely and rewrite it from a blank page, because most problems in prose are failures of perception rather than failures of phrasing.
- 7Write for a Reader Who Doesn't Already Know What You Know1 min
The writer's most persistent blind spot is assuming the reader shares the writer's private context, and most confusing prose comes from failing to notice that gap rather than from bad grammar.
- 8Slow, Daily Practice Beats Talent or Inspiration1 min
Good prose is produced by unhurried, habitual daily attention to sentences over long periods, not by natural talent or by waiting for inspiration to strike.
About Verlyn Klinkenborg
Verlyn Klinkenborg spent decades on the New York Times editorial board, writing the long-running 'The Rural Life' column known for its precise, observational prose. He taught writing for years at Yale and elsewhere, and this book distills the notes and exercises he developed there.
