Perusing the web for an article on active and passive voice usage in business communication (for my professional writing students) I stumbled across Ed Barr's really great blog.
My favorite recent posting is entitled "You only need two words."
I think this concept of "concision as emphasis" is fabulous for professional writing students, and in some ways can be a basis for creative writing as well. It's not always about how much detail you can add. It's not the fancy words or the beautifully extended metaphor. Often the most profound messages stand out simply because of their, well, simplicity.
To me, these statements share another commonality, (which I've fixated on since I just prepared a lecture about sentence structure). These two-word sentences only include a subject and a verb. An object is not included, not necessary. These sentences focus on the action of a single entity, and declare a type of singularity. One person, one action, one moment, one impact. These sentences expand emotionally because they define only a single point out there somewhere. It is the reader's responsibility, then, to position herself in regards to the sentence. "How does this change me, now?" she might ask. What has ultimately been accomplished, then, is a sentence that necessarily engages the reader by not dictating how she must relate to that new information. Relationships are made, but they are more profound since the reader is part of the process. She understands.
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