Strunk's Elementary Principles of Composition for Creative Writers

Strunk's Elementary Principles of Composition for Creative Writers

As a student of creative writing, I have heard many edicts on how to write. Starting with "write what you know," and ending with "use the active voice," some of these pan and some of them don't. Some have their historic places and historical uses that are no longer relevant to modern works of literature. But among many of the works of reference that I've run into, William Strunk's little book that was later published as The Elements of Style has some of the most helpful tips for creative writers. Of compositional principles, Strunk's seem to hold best.

The eleven elementary principles of composition can be found all over the internet and in his book. I will visit each of these principles through a creative lens and, to the best of my own ability, explain its implication or its use.

Choose a suitable design and stick to it.

This principle says a lot in a short amount of time. It asks you to consider what it is that you are writing before you have started to write. The poet may know what form it is that they want to write in, or the novelist may understand that they are working on a discrete chapter. In an ever expanding moment of creativity, the author is asked to consider the type of chapter or the pacing of the short story. Chapters may have, of necessity, expanding moments of plot, character, and setting that form individual arcs as well as collective arcs. Short stories may need to be even punchier than the novel chapter, allowing us a briefer time with the narrator to arrive at a universal truth. Each poem is a story told by its narrator just as much as the scene and sequel tell a story. Thinking about form will help ensure a more successful piece if any of the initial planning was of use. And if nothing else, the advice to simply put a pen to paper (or finger to key) and write is king.

Make the paragraph the unit of composition.

This principle asks to consider the paragraph and what it functions as: a collection of sentences on the same topic. It is myth that the paragraph needs to be of any particular length. It can be a single sentence or a number of hundred-word-long sentences. So long as the contents of the paragraph go together, this can be considered a basic unit of composition. As a creative writer, I would ask to categorize even more narrowly, and look at individual punctuation marks, words, sentences, and paragraphs omnidirectionally. Each creative moment must hang and flow together in order for the piece to work its best magic, or, as many of these principles, must make meaning of its own exception to the rule.

Use the active voice.

This principle is a bit more technical and its meaning can be evasive for less experienced writers of English. In active voice, the subject acts upon an object.

"Ace wrote advice." 

is written in the active voice following the SVO, subject verb object, format. In passive voice:

"Advice was written by Ace." 

the object, or what is acted upon, comes at the beginning of the sentence, followed by the verb, then the subject, or the actor of the sentence.

Put statements in positive form.

The word not shows inherent weakness, arguably, and saying "not honest," is not as strong as saying, "dishonest." Strunk goes on to say that placing negative and positive in opposition can be powerful, such as:

"The writer was not confident, but nervous."

But using unnecessary auxiliary (helping) words weakens the sentence.

"I am jogging."

versus

"I jog."

Use definite, concrete language.

Instead of commenting that the living room was drab, write the specific details that make it drab. Instead of writing an elegy about the sadness of life lost, write about the particular bow tie that a loved one was buried in and evoke the feeling of sadness. Evoke with sensations and images. Instead of saying the weather was bad, write how the weather was bad: raining every day for weeks, or a dry period that spelled drought. The examples are infinite, but if you as the writer run into many generalities in your work, revisit them and get more specific, more concrete, more definite.

Omit needless words.

This principle can me one of the most ruthless, but it points out that effective writing is concise. If there are words that do not add to overall meaning or sustain themselves with meaning, then the word may be omitted. Sometimes this means words like sometimes, others it means "whether or not" can be "whether."

The best practice for the writer is, while revising and editing, to put every word on trial for its life. I also would extend this to punctuation marks: are they grammatical and also functioning as intended?

Avoid a succession of loose sentences

This principle can also be stated as "Use a variety of sentence structures." The writer who has practiced and tinkered with varying sentence structures can intuitively begin to weave together different sentences to create a desired pace. Consider length and tightness as well as punctuation when writing creatively. This can also be dangerous. Following a loose, *legato* passage with something short and punchy will require the contents of the punchy sentence to justify the abrupt change in tempo. Strunk comments that flowing sentences that have two phrases conjoined by a conjunction can be dangerous and lead to monotone writing. Supplemental advice to this principle may be to read your work aloud, and consider whether the tone and pacing is truly the best it can be.

Consider your own work. Are the sentences mostly the same rhythm, or meter? Could there be variation provided by the variation in

Express coordinate ideas in similar form.

This can be rephrased as "write using parallel structure." Parallel structure can be defined as a balance within one or more sentences of similar phrases or clauses that have the same grammatical structure.. Famous examples include Charles Dickens in a Tale of Two Cities.

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair."

For practice, consider some of your own writing where you are proposing similar or coordinate ideas. Are they presented in the same grammatical form, creating a parallel structure? How could you revise the work so that this is the case?

Keep related words together.

The distance between words arguably reflects the relationship between them, and at any length can affect the coherence between them. To keep related words together, succinctly, is to have modifiers next to the modified, subject next to verb, pronoun next to antecedent. This will make the cohesion between the words stronger.

For practice, look at modifiers in your own work. Are related words together? Check for modifiers, pronouns, and subjects next to modified phrases, antecedents, and verbs respectively. If there is any distance, is there a reason why that can be justified?

In summaries, keep to one tense.

This is not only important to the essayist, but to the novelist and to the poet as well. To consider point of view is to simultaneously consider the audience and narrator. Often this point of view is reflected in the tensing of verbs. Consistency among them is key, and when there are shifts in the tense, there needs to be justified. Narratorial shifts can be useful if handled correctly, as in to show differences in time.

Place the emphatic words of a sentence at the end

Because of his cunning, the man was used in stealing state secrets.

Psalms 23:4 is a really strong example of this:

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me

As with all of the above, the best way to perfect our adherence to these principles in generative writing is to consider examples and counterexamples and to be conscious of them and their constraints while writing. Revision will be a place for these principles as well.