篇章
Sentence is weakened by redundant word.
Verbs * Adverbs * Adjectives
Use active and precise verbs；
Most adverbs are unnecessary；
Use adjectives when a job that the noun alone wouldn't be doing;
Don't use adverbs unless they do necessary work.
Little qualifier
They dilute your style and your persuasiveness and whittle away some fraction of the reader's trust
Punctuation
The Period: Do reach it soon enough
The Exclamation Point: Don't use it unless you must to achieve a certain effect
The dash:
① to amplify or justify in the second part of the sentence a thought you stated in the first part;
② to use involves two dashes, which set apart a parenthetical thought within a longer sentence
The colon: to bring your sentence to a brief halt
词汇
It's virtually a toss-up
it's s a toss-up 口语
used when you do not know which of two things will happen, or which oftwo things to choose:
例：I don't know who'll get the job – it's a toss-up between Carl and Steve.
This kind of prose is littered with precipitous cliffs and lacy spiderwebs...
✏️ be littered with something
1.if something is littered with things, there are a lot of those things in it
同义 be full of something
例：Recent business news has been littered with stories of companiesfailing.[及物动词]
2.(也作litter up) if things litter an area, there are a lot of themin that place, scattered in an untidy way:
Clothes littered the floor.
✏️ litter something with something
例：The desk was littered with papers.
What is so eerie about these sentences is that they have no people in them
eerie：strange and frightening:
例：The eerie sound of an owl hooting at night
Don't inflate an incident to make it more outlandish than it actually was.
Outlandish:strange and unusual:
例：Her story seemed so outlandish.
仿：He attempted to draw others heed by outlandish behavior.
感想
Yet many writers are paralyzed by the thought that they are competing with everybody else who is trying to write and presumably doing it better.
对于Zinsser提及写作界业内竞争情况，村上先生在《我的职业是小说家》却有不同说法：
小说家之所以宽容，或许与文学圈并非一个你死我活的社会有关系。换句话说，（大抵）不会因为一位新作家登场，便导致一位在台上多年的作家失业。这类事情至少不会赤裸裸地发生，这一点与职业体育的世界截然不同。一旦有一位新选手加盟团队，就必定有一位老选手或难以出人头地的新人变成自由签约选手，乃至退出队伍，这种现象在文学界基本看不到。此外，也不会出现某部小说卖了十万本，而导致其他小说少卖十万本的情形。有时反而因为新作家的作品畅销，带动小说圈整体呈现出勃勃生机，滋润了整个行业。
村上先生承认，小说家包括他自己都十分自我,有傲骨，都认为“唯有自己所做的事情、所写的东西最正确，除了特殊的例子之外，其他作家或多或少都有些荒诞不经”，常对于业内人士的称赞吝啬，但小说家对于文学圈内竞争并未如此执着。一则，并不会因他人的成功而导致自己失业退伍，反而会因他人的成功带动整个业内发展而使自己受益。而最重要，写小说不是易事，真正能久居业内、笔耕不缀者并不多。
自己虽非业内人士，但更倾向于村上先生的分析。细想，村上书中那节题目#小说家真的宽容吗#长篇论述自己这一观点，让读者信服，切题合理。On writing Well 这本书的重点是想读者分享如何规避、提高写作，对于业内人士是否竞争一说的个人观点一笔带过即可，无需用大量事实、数据分析让读者觉得可行性，Zinsser当可不必为了读者相信而长篇大论。想说，对于观点不同读者不同倾向，若有需自然会自己取舍。在想，书中谈及写作为自己而写不需迎合读者。可为什么会出现这个问题，不本来就该这样吗？读者读书本就是为了获得知识或听灵魂深处的故事让自己受益，既然如此为啥还要太高姿态让他人迎合。
今天读村上《我的职业是小说家》提到河合隼雄先生，初次见目光呆滞、毫无生气，而第二次灵动活跃差若两人，村上这样描述：
大约是抹杀自己，或者说让自己接近于无，试图将对方的“存在状态”自然地——比如说作为文本——原封不动吸噬进去。
读此对于河合隼雄先生这种倾听十分敬佩，抹杀自己而原封不动吸噬全部再展露自己。在阅读时，或许对于读者的观点我们应该真正听懂、明白其意图，内化后有所取舍，而不是一开始就批判。就如之前书友分享有人批判《三体》语言不够优美，为啥要对语言苛刻，书的情节、思想不更精彩吗，取其精华呀。
