《On writing well》在英文世界里被稱為寫作圣經，整本書的核心只有一個：簡潔（Simplicity）。該書并非只針對專業作家，而是面向每個有寫作需求的人，也不是只針對文學寫作，演講稿、工作報告、郵件信函也都可參照，普通人遵循著書中的寫作指南，反復打磨，都可寫出干凈、漂亮的小文。
全書共分四章，第一章為“原則(Principle)”，共分7小篇。其他章節后續每周更新。
注：括號中內容為原書的上下文。
1.The transaction交易
Writing wasn't easy and wasn't fun. It was hard and lonely, and the words seldom just flowed.
寫作并不容易也并不好玩，它是艱難而又孤獨的，它也并非是語言的自然流淌。
Rewriting is the essence of the writing.
修改才是寫作的本質。
The professional writer must establish a daily schedule and stick to it.
專業作家會建立每天的寫字計劃并嚴格執行。
If your job is to write every day, you learn to do it like any other job.
如果你的工作就是每天寫作，那么你得學會像其他工作一樣做好它（而無論你是否在狀態，開心或沮喪）。
Writing is craft, not an art.
寫作是門手藝，而非藝術。
The problem is to find the real man or woman behind the tension. Ultimately the product that any writer has to sell is not the subject being written about a topic, but who he or she is.
（當你坐下來時，你會不安，你正嘗試著把自己真實的一部分通過文字躍然紙上，它并不容易。）問題就是要找到這種不安背后那個真實的人。其實，最終每個人的作品并非關于他談論的主題，而是關于“他是誰。”
2.Simplicity簡潔
The secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components. Every word that serves no function, every long word that could be a short word, every adverb that carries the same meaning that’s already in the verb ,every passive construction that leaves the reader unsure of who is doing ,what---these are the thousand and one adulterants that weaken the strength of a sentence.
好的寫作其秘密就是要剝離整個句子只留下最干凈的構成部分。沒有功用的詞、可以用短句代替的長句、和動詞同義的副詞、讓讀者不明主語的句子，各種雜物都在削弱一個句子的表達力量。
The answer is to clear our heads of clutter. Clear thinking becomes clear writing.
（我們如何寫作出如盧梭《瓦爾登湖畔》般簡練的文字？）答案就是要剔除我們頭腦中的雜亂，只有清晰的思考才有清晰的寫作。
If the reader is lost, it’s usually because the writer hasn’t been careful enough……Faced with such obstacles……readers blames themselves and they go back over the mystifying sentence, or over the whole paragraph……making guesses and moving on ……Writers is making them work too hard, and they will look for one who is better at this craft.
Writers must therefore constantly ask: what am I trying to say? Surprisingly often they don’t know.
(現在有太多東西在爭搶讀者的注意力，新聞、老婆孩子、電視、手機、游戲，還有睡眠)
如果讀者在閱讀中迷失了，通常是因為作者不夠小心。
（是不是句子中有太多廢話讓讀者不知道在說什么？是不是時間線錯亂？是不是句子前后沒有因果關系？這些都會打斷句子前后的連接性，讓讀者迷失其中。）
讀者面對這些障礙，常會責怪自己，然后再往回看嘗試弄懂作者在說什么。長此以往，讀者就會去找那些說得清道理，讓閱讀更容易的作者。
所以我們要經常自問：我正在嘗試要說的是什么？
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.
寫作是辛苦的。一個清晰簡練的句子并非偶然得之，很少有第一次就很好的句子，甚至第三次也不是。所以深處絕望時要記住：如果你發現寫作是艱難的，那是因為它本來就不容易。
With each rewrite I try to make what I given written tighter, stronger and more precise, eliminating every sentence that’s not doing useful work. Then I go over it once more, reading it aloud, and am always amazed at how much clutter can still be cut.
該書每次再版校訂時(第6版)，我仍會盡量使其更緊湊、更有力、更精準，刪除掉沒有用處的詞。然后我會再回顧一遍，大聲朗讀出來，還總能驚訝地發現有那么多雜亂的東西可以刪掉。
3.Clutter雜亂
I would put the brackets around every component in a piece of writing that wasn’t doing useful work.
(有沒有什么方法第一眼就識別出哪些是多余的呢？)我會把看上去沒有用處的詞或句子用括號括起來，嘗試著跳過他們去看文章原意是否受到影響。
Most first drafts can be cut by 50 percent without losing any information or losing the author’s voice.
大多數人的初稿刪減掉50%是不會影響文章的大意的。
Reexamine each sentence you put on the paper. Is every word doing new work? Can any thought ne expressed with more economy? Is anything pompous or pretentious or faddish? Are you hanging on to something useless just because you think it’s beautiful?
重新檢查每個句子，每個詞都起到作用了么？有沒有更簡約的表達方式？是否有些詞過于花哨或者趕時髦？是否堅持要使用某些沒用處的詞只是因為你覺得它很美？
Simplify, simplify.
簡潔，簡潔。
4.Style 風格
If you give me an eight-page article and I tell you to cut it to four pages, you’ll howl and say it can’t be done. Then you’ll go home and do it, and it will be much better. After that comes the hard part: cutting it to three.
如果你給我八頁的文章，我會告訴你拿回去改到四頁，你憤怒地說做不到。然后你會回到家里，改到四頁，嗯，好多了。接下來，才是最難的部分：你要改到三頁。
This is the problem of writers who set out deliberately to garnish their prose .You lose whatever it is that makes you unique. The reader will notice if you are putting on airs. Readers want the person who is talking to them to sound genuine. Therefore a fundamental rule is: be yourself.
（盡量去塑造風格就像戴假發，看上去不錯，但人們稱贊的并不是你整體看上去多么漂亮而只會稱贊做假發的師傅手藝是多么獨到。）這就是寫作人的問題---當他們打算刻意打扮自己的文章時，就會失去自己的獨特性。如果作者在裝腔作勢，讀者是能注意到的。讀者想要的是一個能和他們對話的真實的人。因此一個基本原則是：做你自己。
They must relax, and they must have confidence.
寫作者必須放松并且保持自信。
I can only offer the consoling thought that you are not alone. Some days will go better than others. Some will go so badly that you’ll despair of ever writing again. We have all had many of those days and will have many more.
(有沒有方法可以讓人不再緊張并保有自信呢？并沒有)
我能提供的只是些安慰：你并不孤獨。有時候會感覺良好，有時候會很壞，讓你絕望到不會再次拿起筆。我們都曾經歷過那些日子，以后也會經歷更多。
Paragraph 1 is a disaster ---a tissue of generalities that seem to have come out of a machine. No person could have written them. Paragraph 2 isn’t much better. But paragraph 3 begins to have a somewhat human quality, and by paragraph 4 you begin to sound like yourself. You’ve started to relax.
第一段就是個災難，大多數就像從生硬的機器中蹦出來一樣。第二段并沒更好，第三段才開始有了點樣子，直到第四段你才開始像自己，你才放松開來。
Writers are obviously at their most natural when they write in the first person. Writing is an intimate transaction between two people, conducted on paper, and it will go well to extent that it retains humanity. Therefore I urge people to write in the first person: to use “I” and “me” and “We” and “us”.
寫作者采用第一人稱時才是最自在的。寫作是兩個人之間的親密對話，只不過是以紙上文字的方式但仍然保留了溝通時的人性。因此我勸人們寫作時用第一人稱“我”“我們”。
I don’t want to meet “one”---he’s a boring guy. I want a professor with a passion for his subject to tell me why it fascinates him.
（在文章的表述中）我不想見到“一個人”的說法，因為“這個人”無趣。我想要的是一個滿懷熱情的教師告訴我為什么這個主題使他如此著迷。
Sell yourself, and you subject will exert its own appeal. Believe in your own identity and your own opinions. Writing is an act of ego, and you might as well admit it. Use its energy to keep yourself going.
去展示自己，你的文章主題會自然發揮其魅力。相信你自己的獨特性和觀點，寫作是自我的展現。利用它的能量去保持自己前行。
5.The Audience受眾
You are writing for yourself. Don’t try to visualize the great mass audience. There is no such audience---every reader is a different person. Don’t try to guess what sort of thing editors want to publish or what you think the country is in a mood to read. Editors and readers don’t know what they want to read until they read it. Besides,they’re always looking for something new.
你是為自己而寫作。不要去想普羅大眾。每個讀者都是不同的，也不要去猜測編輯們想要出版什么以及這個國家正適合讀什么。編輯和讀者并不知道他們要讀什么直到他們讀到它。而且，他們總是尋求些新的東西。
One is craft, the other is attitude. The first is a question of mastering a precise skill. The second is a question of how you use that skill to express your personality.
（有人可能會問，之前提到過我們寫作時應盡力抓取讀者注意力，現在又說要為自己而寫，不是自相矛盾么？）但并不是，一個是手藝，一個是態度。抓取讀者的注意力比如保持文章流暢易懂，這些是寫作的技巧，這是為了讀者的閱讀體驗。而怎么用這種技巧來表現自己的個性、觀點就關乎寫作的態度：你不是為愉悅別人而寫。
But on the larger issue of whether the reader likes you, or likes what you are saying or how you are saying it, or agrees with it , or feels an affinity for your sense of humor or your vision of life, don’t give him a moment’s worry. You are who you are, he is who he is, and either you’ll get along or you won’t.
（如果由于文字呆板乏味，或者技術細節沒解釋清楚，讀者在閱讀中打盹兒了，那就是你的失誤。）但在更大層面上，讀者是不是喜歡你、喜歡你所談論的東西、你談論的方式，是否對你的幽默感抱有好感、贊同與否你的生活視角，對此不要有一刻的擔心。你是你，他是他，也許你能與他和睦相處，也許不能，都不要在意。
6.Words語言
If you find yourself writing that someone recently enjoyed a spell of illness, or that a business has been enjoying a slump ,ask yourself how much they enjoyed it.
如果你在描寫某個最近正罹患疾病的人，或者一個生意受挫的商人，問問你自己：他們多大程度上感受到了。
Make a habit of reading what is being written today and what was written by masters. Writing is learned by imitation. If anyone asked me how I learned to write, I’d say I learned by reading the men and women who were doing the kind of writing I wanted to do and trying to figure out how they did it.
養成習慣：讀一讀今天人們正在寫什么，過去那些大師又在寫什么。寫作是可以通過模仿學習的。如果有人問我怎么學會寫作的，我會說是通過讀那些我想要模仿的人的文章，并嘗試弄懂他們是怎么做到的。
Also bear in mind, when you’re choosing words and stringing them together, how they sound. This may seem absurd: readers read with their eyes. But in fact they hear what they are reading far more than you realize. Therefore such matters as rhythm and alliteration are vital to every sentence.
要記住，當你選詞造句時，注意他們聽起來怎么樣。這個聽起來也許挺怪：讀者是用眼睛去讀的。事實上，人是用耳朵來“聽”他們在讀的東西，所以像押韻、音節對句子就很關鍵。
Such considerations of sound and rhythm should go into everything you write. If all your sentences move at the same plodding gait ,which even you recognize as deadly but don’t know how to cure, read them aloud.
對于所有的寫作，你都應該考慮其韻律或聽起來怎么樣。如果你所有的句子讀起來都是同樣的干癟乏味，但是不知道怎么解決，那就大聲讀出來。（反復讀就會知道問題所在，比如重新調整詞語的順序、用鮮活的詞替換掉老詞、刪減長句成短句等。）
Remember: somebody out there is listening.
記住：別人正在聆聽。
7.Usage詞語的用法
One helpful approach is to try to separate usage from jargon.
一個有益的技巧是盡量不要使用行話術語。
Good usage, to me, consists of using good words if they already exist---as they almost always do---to express myself clearly and simply to someone else.
（詞語的用法，沒有固定的好壞之說）于我而言，只要能盡可能地清楚、簡潔地表達自己的意思并傳達給對方，而無論這些是新詞還是老詞，就是好詞。
To be continued...
未完待續...
