Reader's Digest WRITE BETTER SPEAK BETTER The Reader's Digest Association, Inc. Pleasantville, New York The Reader's Digest Association Ltd., Montreal, Canada The acknowledgments that appear on pages 728-730 are hereby made a part of this copyright page. © 1972 The Reader's Digest Association, Inc. © 1972 The Reader's Digest Association [Canada] Ltd. Reproduction in any manner, in whole or in part, in English or in other languages, is prohibited. All rights are reserved. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 75-183859 Printed in the United States of America Introduction Your verbal ability is among the most important skills you pos- sess. Throughout your life, in all kinds of situations from the classroom to the board room, people form their opinions of you on the basis of how you speak and how you write. Understanding how to use words effectively can bring you increased confidence and pave your way to success in school, in business, in your social life—in every area where communication is important. Write Better, Speak Better is designed to help you achieve this goal. It brings together in one place the most practical advice avail- able from experts in the field of communications. Its fifty-nine chapters have been carefully selected and organized by the editors of the Reader's Digest to give you a complete course in the writing and speaking skills that are essential in your everyday life, whether you are a housewife, a businessman, a student, or simply a person who wants to say \\hat you mean and get results. The book is divided into four parts. The first, "How to Write Better," covers in detail the many writing situations you encounter, from sending an invitation to preparing a business report or writing your congressman. Sample letters and lists of tips make the material clear and easy to understand. Part Two reviews the basic elements of word power: vocabulary, grammar, punctuation, and spelling. Part Three, "How to Speak Better," gives helpful, concrete ad\'ice on speak- ing situations that include everyda)' conversation, what to sa)" on the telephone, job interviews, running a meeting, how to use anecdotes in a speech, and organizing a formal talk complete with visual aids. The final section tells you how to detect and correct flaws in your \oice or pronunciation. The special fifty-page feature, "A Dictionary of Usage," provides ready reference to common problems in writing and speaking. Study the chapters, review the tips, take the progress tests, and you'll soon find that words reallv can work wonders for you. Contents Part one HOW TO WRITE BETTER 1. Good writing—a skill you can learn 3 2. Secrets of good letter writing 7 3. Handling your personal correspondence 17 4. Give your letters the right look 35 5. Social notes and invitations 47 6. How to write for information 82 7. How to complain and get action 89 8. Writing your public officials 104 9. Writing to newspapers, magazines, and TV 113 10. Applying to schools and colleges 128 11. Writing and your college career 143 12. How to write a research paper 147 13. Precis, book reports, and project reports 163 14. Taking written examinations 177 15. Applying for a job 193 16. Good writing is good business 206 17. Picture the people you are writing to 211 18. Plan your letters before you write 224 19. How to write sales letters 233 20. How to say No with a smile 251 21. How to handle delicate situations 263 22. How to write business reports 278 Part two THE TOOLS OF THE TRADE 23. Good craftsmanship pays dividends 291 24. Seven modern steps to word power 293 25. Learning words by the 'unfolding process' 301 26. Quick vocabulary builder: words from Latin and Greek 309 27. Two keys to clarity: grammar and usage 320 28. Good grammar in a nutshell 326 29. Why spelling and punctuation are important 338 30. Punctuation pointers 341 31. How to become a good speller 357 32. The simple rules of spelling 361 33. Can you read what you write? 379 Part three HOW TO SPEAK BETTER 34. Of cabbages and kings 385 35. The secrets of good conversation 391 36. The art of being a successful host 412 37. When you meet a famous person 419 38. Ten conversation problems and how to solve them 433 39. How you come across on the telephone 446 40. How to handle an interview 454 41. The five steps to successful selling 464 42. How to run a meeting 471 43. 'Me? Speak in front of a group?' 482 44. How to beat stage fright 486 45. How to pick your subject 492 46. How to prepare your speech 503 47. Start with a list of points 519 48. How to sell your idea 528 49. Use visuals to prove your point 537 50. Preparing yourself to speak 552 51. What makes a good speaker 564 52. The secret of good delivery 569 Part four LEARN TO USE YOUR VOICE 53. Beware of these speech blemishes 581 54. How to improve your voice 593 55. Your child talks like you 615 56. That bugaboo: correct pronunciation 626 57. Three pronunciation pitfalls 628 58. Recent trends in American speech 636 59. Our wonderful, erratic language 641 A DICTIONARY OF USAGE 649 TEST YOUR SKILLS: ANSWERS 699 INDEX 709 I PART ONE How to write better WHAT YOU WILL FIND IN Part one 1. Good writing—a skill you can learn 3 2. Secrets of good letter writing 7 3. Handling your personal correspondence 17 4. Give your letters the right look 35 5. Social notes and invitations 47 6. How to write for information 82 7. How to complain and get action 89 8. Writing your public officials 104 9. Writing to newspapers, magazines, and TV 113 10. Applying to schools and colleges 128 11. Writing and your college career 143 12. How to write a research paper 147 13. Precis, book reports, and project reports 163 14. Taking written examinations 177 15. Applying for a job 193 16. Good writing is good business 206 17. Picture the people you are writing to 211 18. Plan your letters before you write 224 19. How to write sales letters 233 20. How to say No with a smile 251 21. How to handle delicate situations 263 22.How to write business reports 278 Good writing — a skill you can learn The ability to communicate clearly in writing is one of the most important skills you will ever master. It will help you to get your ideas across effectively and to get the results you want in your business and personal life. There is no mystery to good writing—it is a skill you can learn. J^ike fine food, good writing is something we approach with rehsh and enjoy from the first taste to the last. And good writers. Hke good chefs, do not suddenly appear full-blown, as Athena sprang from the head of her father, Zeus. Quite the contrary, just as the chef serves an intensive apprenticeship mastering the skills of his trade, the writer sits at his table and devotes long hours to achieving a style, a precision, a clarity in his writing, whatever its purpose—schoolwork, matters of business, or purelv social communication. You may be sure that the more painstaking the effort, the more effective the writing, and the more rewarding. There are still some remote places in the world where you might find a public scribe to do your business or social writing for you, for a fee. There are a few executives who are blessed with that rare kind of sec- retary who can take care of all sorts of correspondence with no more than a quick memorandum to work from. But for most of us. if there is anv writing to be done, we have to do it ourselves. We have to write school papers (book reports, term papers, college applications), business papers (memos, reports, letters of inquiry, let- ters of adjustment), home papers (everything from notes to the milk- man to invitations to a church supper). We are constantly called on to ^^'RITE BETTER, SPEAK BETTER put words to paper. It would be difficult to count the number of such words, messages, letters, and reports put into the mails or delivered by hand, but the daih' figure must be enormous. What is more, everyone who writes expects, or at least hopes, that his writing will be read. Yet we know very well, from our own experience, that much that is handwritten and more that is typed is only skimmed, and sometimes not read at all. Every day too much reading matter (newspapers, maga- zines, leaflets, as well as letters ) comes into our hands. With all the du- ties and responsibilities we have in our business and personal lives, there simply isn't the time to go through all those pages which clutter our desks or cram our mail boxes. And our own correspondence, what- ever its form and shape and size, must compete with the letters and cor- respondence of everyone else \\'ho is doing exactly what we are doing: writing. Under these circumstances we must turn out a more attractive, more interesting, more tasteful product. We want to arouse and hold the in- terest of the reader of our correspondence or communication. We want whate\er we write to be read, from first word to last, not just tossed into some "letters-to-be-read" file or into a wastepaper basket. This is the reason we bend our efforts toward learning and practicing the skills of interesting, effective writing. Keep it brief "That writer does the most, who gives the reader the most informa- tion, and takes from him the least time," wrote Charles C. Colton, churchman, gambler, and author, some two hundred years ago. This is an observation which everyone who writes should commit to heart, an observation to post above the desk of ever\' businessman who dictates a memo, of every housewife who pens a letter, and of every student who taps out a term study on his typewriter. The purpose of writing is to communicate: a thought, an idea, a senti- ment, a fact. The more concrete and concise these elements in a com- munication, the more precise, the more rewarding they are to the reader. The manner in which you communicate information is enor- mously important. It must come to us in palatable form to command our attention, and to hold it. "Brevity is the soul of wit," said Shakespeare's Polonius in Hamlet. This was a nice touch of ironv since, as we all know, Polonius was a GOOD WRITING A SKILL YOU CAN LEARN rather long-winded gentleman. Nevertheless, his maxim warrants re- membering, along with Mr. Colton's admonition that we demand the least time from our readers. But brevity, too, rec^uires a skillful hand. We can do very well without the reams of unnecessary detail ( especially of that "he said, she said" variety ) which we so frequently encounter. Make it clear and complete On the other hand, nothing can be more irritating and sometimes frus- trating than the omission of essential detail. Suppose, for example, the shirts you manufacture come in several styles, colors, and sizes, but the order vou have received in the mail gives no specifications. Or you are driving to visit a friend in the countrv and vou come to a fork in a coun- try lane; \'Ou consult the map he has sent you and he has omitted both the fork and the road you are to take. Or someone writes down a tele- phone message from your out-of-town friends, telling you they're going to be in the citv and will drop in to see you; but the message contains no date, no time, and nothing to indicate whether they are coming alone or with their children. And there are the instructions for setting up your hi-fi phonograph and tape recorder which take for granted that you know what a "patch cord" is. Unquestionably there is virtue in brevity, but as these examples show, you must never assume that your reader is as expert or as knowledge- able as vou are about whatever it is you are writing. Bre\it\' is not an excuse for lack of clarity. And clarity, above all, is essential to what you have to say on paper. Clarity, precision, conciseness—each is of utmost importance to effec- tive writing. But what of style, the wax in which you pen your corre- spondence, business or social? Certainlv vou want to avoid stiffness and rigidity in any kind of writing you do ( even when vou send off an an- gry letter to the manager of vour local department store to complain that the bed you ordered arrived with just three legs and no head- board). At the same time, you wouldn't write a report on the market conditions in Hong Kong in the "chummy" manner of a letter to a cousin in Duluth or to that college roommate who lias just become president of some giant, and competitive, organization. The simplest and best approach toward developing your own particu- lar style in writing is to write as you speak. This would seem to be just about as easy a task as vou could set yourself—but in reality it isn't.