Table of Contents

• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• Chapter 1. Introduction. This 6-page introductory chapter has the following subheadings:
  • The General Problem
  • The Specific Problem
  • The Book’s Aim and Plan of Attack
  • The Book’s Theme
  • Simplicity’s By-Products
  • Writing Styles. This section sketches the writing styles of Albert Einstein and Abraham Lincoln.
  • A Caveat
  • A Matter of Taste
  • Learning to Write. This section describes the evolution of George Orwell and Somerset Maugham as writers.
  • Roadmap to the Rest of the Book
• Chapter 2. Efficiency Rules. This chapter’s 25 rules show you how to write efficiently. Each rule is amply exemplified.
• Chapter 3. Effectiveness Rules. This chapter’s 12 rules show you how to improve writing effectiveness in ways other than efficiency, although efficiency often is a by-product. Several examples illustrate each rule’s application.
• Chapter 4. Conclusion. This chapter has the following subheadings:
  • Recap of the Problem and its Solution
  • A Different Perspective on the Problem
  • A Capsule of Good Writing
  • The Cumulative Effect of 1 Rule
  • The Cumulative Effect of Multiple Rules. This section uses 7 examples to illustrate the combined power of the book’s rules. The “Examples” link to the left presents these 7 examples’ end result and 3 other examples that are not in the book.
  • Reading and Editing
  • Numerical Guidelines. This section criticizes a major university’s numerical guidelines on a research paper’s length and number of references.
  • A Final Thought on Simplicity
• Appendix A. A Catalog of Verbosity. The catalog presents in tabular form 976 pairs of equivalent expressions. Each pair is equivalent in content but not in efficiency. One member of each pair is verbose; the other member is concise. The table identifies the source (a book, essay, or newspaper article) of each verbose construction. Studying the table will help you to avoid such wordiness.
• Appendix B. Writing Numbers. This appendix reviews 6 style manuals’ rules for writing numbers, and it states and explains this book’s position on the subject.
• Bibliography
• Index