Conciseness

Conciseness is something I struggle with. I know the value of being brief, I admire people who can do it, and yet I consistently use three paragraphs where one would do.

Here are some quotes from people who were better at it than me:

I didn’t have time to write you a short letter, so I wrote you a long one.

Blaise Pascal

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Brevity is the soul of wit.

William Shakespeare, Hamlet

The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.

Thomas Jefferson

Omit needless words.

Strunk & White, The Elements of Style

If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.

Albert Einstein

Good prose is like a windowpane.

George Orwell

Not that the story need be long, but it will take a long while to make it short.

Henry David Thoreau

The irony of collecting this many quotes about brevity is not lost on me.