Your Writing Companion
Writing Advice and Instruction from
Precise Edit
Samples from
300 Days of Better
Writing
Bang! Writing with Impact
Precise Edit Training
Manual
Which Word Do I Use?
David Bowman, Owner and Chief Editor of Precise Edit
© 2010, David Bowman
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Your Writing Companion
Writing
Tips for a Year
300 Days of Better Writing
Precise
Edit Training Manual
Bang! Writing with Impact
Which
Word Do I Use? A Quickie Guide to the Most Confusing Word Pairs
Table of Contents
300 Days of Better Writing
Day 1: Use the rhetorical subject as the grammatical subject.
Day 2: Place a comma before a conjunction that joins two independent clauses.
Day 4: Avoid over-generalizing.
Day 5: Finish sentences with the most important information.
Day 6: Place ending punctuation inside the quotation marks.
Day 7: Use you only when you are writing to or about the reader.
Bang! Writing with Impact
5. Emphasize alternatives by adding the conjunctions “or” or “nor” between all items in a series.
19. Emphasize a particular characteristic by pairing it with its opposite.
39. Attack the credibility of your critics to emphasize the superiority of your ideas.
58. Increase reader engagement by omitting the conclusion to a logical argument.
96. Provide a summary of previous content to emphasize how it relates to the next topic.
Precise Edit Training Manual
It Is What It Is (Starting sentences with it)
Which Word Do I Use?
Information about the 4 Guides
Introduction
Welcome to 300 Days of Better Writing. This writing guide provides you with 300 strategies for writing clearly, effectively, and correctly. This is a great companion to our Precise Edit Training Manual, although each book can be used independently. Whether you read one new tip a day, read them all at once, or find a specific topic you need, this guide will help you write better.
How this guide is organized
This guide loosely follows the organization of the tips in our Writing Tips for a Year series. We distributed the editing, writing, and mechanics tips so you won’t receive tips of the same type all at once. Broad writing topics (e.g., paragraph structure) are broken into individual strategies. These are also distributed throughout the tips so that you have time to learn, practice, and master one strategy before learning a new strategy on the same broad topic.
Day 1: Use the rhetorical subject as the grammatical subject.
Every complete sentence needs a subject. The subject is the Thing, Idea, Person, or Place (TIPP) that “does” the main verb. Consider the sentence “Tom loves Julie.” The main verb here is “loves,” and the subject is “Tom.”
Another name for the subject of a sentence is “grammatical subject.” In the previous example, “Tom” is the grammatical subject because “Tom” is the subject of the sentence.
Sometimes, though, the “doer” of the main action is not the grammatical subject. Consider this sentence: “Finding a solution is our greatest concern.” In this example, “Finding a solution” is the grammatical subject of the verb “is.”
However, we need to ask, “What’s the action being described by this sentence?” The main action is finding a solution. Then we ask, “Who is doing this action?” The answer is “We are.” “We,” therefore, is the rhetorical subject. The TIPP that does the main action is the rhetorical subject, whether or not it is the grammatical subject.
For clear and effective writing, the rhetorical subject should be used as the grammatical subject. Based on this, the example sentence can be revised as follows: “We are most concerned with finding a solution.”
Day 2: Place a comma before a conjunction that joins two independent clauses.
The term “independent clause” refers to a complete sentence, whether it stands alone or is part of a longer sentence. It has a grammatical subject and a main verb, at a minimum.
Consider the sentence, “Tom loves Julie, and Julie loves Frank.” This has two independent clauses. The first is “Tom loves Julie,” and the second is “Julie loves Frank.” The two clauses are joined by “and,” so you need a comma before the “and.”
Whenever you join two independent clauses by a conjunction (and, but, or, yet, so, for, nor), put a comma in front of the conjunction.
Consider the sentence “Mary winked at me, and Bob sighed.” If you leave out the comma before “and,” the reader will have to decide whether Mary winked at only me or if she winked at me and Bob. Only when the reader gets to “sighed” will he or she realize that Mary is winking at me and that Bob is the person sighing. This makes the sentence confusing, and the reader may have to re-read it to understand its meaning.
That comma makes the sentence clear.
Day 3: Be concise.
“Good things, when short, are twice as good.” (Baltasar Gracian)
Although this quote could be applied to many things, Gracian refers specifically to writing. His point, and it’s a good one, is that texts written simply and briefly are superior to texts written in a lengthy and grandiose style. Longer does not mean better. In fact, the opposite is generally true.
A writer who intentionally lengthens his or her documents will not produce good writing, and the reader will most likely be turned off. However, this does not mean that short is better, either. The point is for everything you write to add value to the reader.
When we talk about economical writing, we echo Gracian. Say what you have to say, but say it simply, clearly, and briefly. Then stop.
Day 4: Avoid over-generalizing.
One of my favorite expressions as a kid was, “Oh, yeah? Prove it.” (I was a precocious child.) Over-generalizing means making a general statement or reaching a conclusion from a very limited number of examples. When you over-generalize, you invite your reader to ask, “Oh, yeah? Prove it.”
If you base an argument, concept, fact, idea, etc. on your over-generalized statement, the reader can discredit everything you have written. The reader only needs one example to prove you wrong.
Here’s the tip that accompanies “avoid over-generalization”: When you make a general statement, make sure it’s true in EVERY case.
Some examples of over-generalizing are:
“As
everyone knows . . .”
“She was always smiling.”
“People
loved her cooking.”
“This is the most exciting movie.”
“The
stores in this town are no good.”
“Text books are
boring.”
“People do this when they’re tired.”
“Men
are pigs, but women are angels.”
“It figures.”
Day 5: Finish sentences with the most important information.
Why finish sentences with the most important information?
Information at the end of a sentence has the most emphasis, the most impact.
People tend to remember best what they last hear or read.
Information at the end of a sentence serves as a transition to the next sentence. When you provide important information, you will likely write more about it or address it in some way.
Ask yourself, “What point am I trying to make, or what important idea am I trying to communicate, in this sentence?” Revise your sentence to place that information at the end.
Day 6: Place ending punctuation inside the quotation marks.
[Note to our friends in Great Britain: reverse the tip in the next paragraph, and you will probably do fine.]
When providing a direct quote or using quotation marks to indicate that you are writing about a word or phrase, the comma or period that ends the phrase or sentence should be placed inside the final quotation mark. [GB: outside the final quotation mark]
Examples:
1. John
said, “I am in love with Julie.”
2. Many people don’t
pronounce the final sound of the words “fast,” “quit,” and
“stop.”
3. When the man shouted “Halt,” I ran away.
However, if your final punctuation is a question mark, semi-colon, or colon, and if that punctuation mark is not part of the quote, then it should go outside.
Example:
Did the
boss say “fire everyone you can”?
Day 7: Use you only when you are writing to or about the reader.
Writers often use you to express a general observation, but it results in incorrect information. Recently, I edited a graduate-level paper that repeatedly used you inappropriately. For example, one sentence said, “When you are in a meeting with your boss, you need to respect his right to express his opinions.” My response was “But I am the boss!”
This statement did not apply to me, so the information in the sentence was incorrect. The principle being expressed might be true, but the delivery was wrong.
Here’s another example: “I like this store because they always give you a discount.” My response was “They never gave one to me!”
Unless you are specifically writing to or about your reader, don’t use you.
Here’s how I revised those two sentences:
“The boss has a right to express his opinions in meetings.”
“I like this store because they always give me a discount.”
Day 8: Limit adjective use.
Adjectives can be useful (such as the one I just used: “useful”), but when you string them together, they can bore, confuse, and turn off your readers.
Consider this sentence: “The big, green, hairy, smelly monster crept out from under the small, afraid, whimpering boy’s bed.”
This has three problems. First, it is boring. The point is that a monster crept. All those extra words detract from the significance of this event. Second, it is complicated. Every time the reader finds a new adjective, he or she has to modify his or her mental image of what is happening. Third, it is confusing. Is the bed or the child small, afraid, and whimpering?
Here’s our advice, in three parts:
Find one word that means what you are trying to say, preferably an action verb or concrete noun instead of an adjective.
If you want to use an adjective before a noun, use only one adjective that means exactly what you are trying to say.
If you want to use adjectives after the noun, don’t use more than two.
TOPICS DISCUSSED IN 300 DAYS OF BETTER WRITING
300 Days to Better Writing covers 38 topics, listed below with the number of daily strategies that address each topic. Note: The number of daily strategies below total more than 300. Some strategies address more than one issue.
agreement, 10
bulleted
lists, 7
clarity, 14
commas, 18
conciseness, 27
convincing
your reader, 22
dashes and hyphens, 7
descriptions, 33
editing
process, 6
engaging readers, 24
formal vs. informal tone,
10
getting to the point, 13
HUPAs, 3
impact and emphasis,
30
introductory phrases / clauses, 11
logic / making sense,
6
mechanics, 20
organization, 14
paragraph structure,
16
paragraphs, 1-sentence, 3
parallelism, 6
preaching,
5
prepositional phrases, 10
pronouns, 9
quotation marks,
4
readers / audience, 23
references / citations, 3
sentence
structure, 31
sentence structure, S-V-O, 3
series, 10
spin,
10
subjects, 12
topic chains, 2
transitions, 11
using the
correct word (usage), 25
verb usage, 25
writers' advice,
20
writing process, 25
Introduction
Welcome to BANG! Writing with Impact. This writing guide will provide you with strategies for making your words stand out and your readers pay attention.
Who is this book
for?
This book is for all writers. A writer is anyone
who communicates in writing, not just novelists, journalists,
etc. This book is for any person who desires to
Change the reader’s mind about a topic,
Convince the reader that you are right,
Convey the importance of an idea, action, or belief,
Make the reader respond or act in a desired manner,
Influence the reader’s behavior,
Propose or set policy,
Establish credibility and leadership,
Write with power, or
Make an impact.
Whether you are writing a letter to a client or colleague, preparing a proposal for funding, developing technical manuals, or publishing a book, you need to write with impact. BANG! provides all the tools you need.
How to use this book
Use
this book any way you want to use it. This is your book.
On the other hand, I do have some recommendations for using these strategies productively.
Write your document. Get the words on paper. Don’t do more than very light editing as you write.
Identify your main points, action steps, concluding arguments, controversial statements, and other ideas that are critical to communicate. These are things you want your reader to do, understand, and believe. Underline them.
The words you underlined in step 2 are the places to apply these strategies. Take a look at how you wrote them, and peruse the strategies found in this book.
Ask yourself these questions:
What am I trying to accomplish?”
What strategies have I already applied?
Am I using a variety of strategies?
What strategies have I not applied?If you used the same strategy three times in a row, replace one with a new strategy.
If you have not applied a strategy to one of the underlined sections, do so. Find the strategy that produces the effect you need or accomplishes your purpose.
You might not use all the strategies in this book. Actually, I would be surprised if you did. You will make choices based on your purpose, writing style, and habits.
You didn’t buy this book so that you can use every possible strategy. You bought this book because you have a purpose to accomplish. Find the strategies that you need.
The point is to help you reflect on the strategies and your purposes, as well as to encourage you to use new strategies. By using new strategies, you bring greater variety to your documents. More variety means more impact because using any strategy repeatedly reduces its effectiveness. Also, more variety in your strategies allows you to make new forms of impact to accomplish specific purposes. This is similar to having more tools in your toolbox. You can perform more tasks, and you can perform your tasks better.
Format
for the strategies
Each
strategy is formatted this way:
Short description of the strategy and purpose. academic name (only useful for impressing your colleagues)
Description / explanation / use / instruction
Caution(s), if any
Sample(s)
What’s not in this book
This is not the book for learning to write clearly or using grammar and punctuation correctly. This book has a very specific purpose: learning how to make an impact with writing.
Those other issues are also important. If you want help writing clearly and correctly, take a look at our other guides, which are described on the final page of this guide. They are available at http://PreciseEdit.com and http://HostileEditing.com.You can get a sample of all three books, and a sample subscription to the writing instruction series.
Sample strategies from Bang! Writing with Impact
Emphasize
alternatives by adding the conjunctions “or” or “nor” between
all items in a series.
polysyndeton
Adding “or” or “nor” between all words in a series emphasizes their differences. This is especially useful when you want to show a string of options or alternatives that cannot be combined. Also, by adding “or” or “nor,” you place individual emphasis on each item in the series. This strategy helps the reader to pay attention to and remember each item. The final items in the series will carry the most emphasis by nature of their placement, so think carefully about which items to place there.
“We could buy or lease or rent or steal our office equipment, but we could not own or build it.”
19
Emphasize
a particular characteristic by pairing it with its opposite.
oxymoron
An oxymoron creates a paradox of words by describing or naming a thing using contradictory terms (e.g., “joyously grieving”). The primary effect of this strategy is to emphasize a characteristic of the thing described. It does this through two means. First, an oxymoron catches the readers’ attention. Second, a seemingly contradictory expression makes the reader consider what the oxymoron means in the given context. When your reader participates in the sense-making process, he or she will be more engaged in the content and more likely to respond to what you write.
If two adjectives or adverbs are used to create the oxymoron, the first adjective or adverb carries the most impact. This occurs when the first descriptive word contradicts the normal connotation of the term being described.
“Cautious
indifference leads to worried
peace.”
“He is a well-educated
fool.”
39
Attack the credibility of your critics to emphasize the
superiority of your ideas.
procatalepsis
Another way to state this strategy is as follows: Demonstrate that your critics are not a valid source of information. Predict their arguments against your idea, and then either disparage their knowledge or demonstrate the greater validity of your own. As seen by these examples, both strategies can be used at the same time.
Be careful with this strategy. It might help you win an argument, but it won’t win you any friends. This strategy raises ethical considerations, so use it cautiously, if at all.
“The press corps is fond of saying we do not know how to handle corporate finances. They went to journalism school. We have advanced degrees in finance administration. They are not in a position to tell us how to handle corporate finances.”
“Farmer Bob in the country has a good point about the need to protect natural resources. We do need to protect our resources. Our 20 plus years of municipal planning experiences have taught us how.”
58
Increase reader engagement by omitting the conclusion to a logical
argument.
enthymeme
When you omit the conclusion to a logical argument, the reader will have to reach the conclusion himself, in a sense, making your argument for you. This is a powerful way to gain reader acceptance for your conclusion. Furthermore, this strategy will increase the reader’s engagement and participation in your ideas. Your reader is participating in discussing the content, which always increases engagement. Here’s how it works.
Major premise, the general truth: Popular novelists can make a lot of money from book sales.
Minor premise: Stephen King is a popular novelist.
[Conclusion, omitted: Stephen King has made a lot of money.]
Two cautions: 1) Make sure the conclusion is the only logical result of your premises (politicians and political commentators often forget this caution) or your reader may reach a different conclusion; and 2) Make sure the conclusion is obvious or your reader may be confused, reducing engagement and preventing acceptance for your idea.
“The
Algoma Lumber Company will only process raw logs that contain a
minimum of 1,400 board feet. Your logs are significantly below this
standard.”
[Missing conclusion: The Algoma Lumber Company will
not process your logs.]
96
Provide a summary of previous content to emphasize how it relates
to the next topic.
metabasis
After having a lengthy discussion of one topic, you may need to focus on a new topic. Providing a summary of the just-finished discussion gives you an opportunity to introduce a new topic and emphasize its relevance to the previous topic. This produces two effects. First, the reader is reminded of essential points, ideas, and action steps. Second, you can emphasize the importance of the upcoming topic.
This strategy is only effective in long documents. Otherwise, the reader may consider it “padding,” i.e., unnecessary text written to lengthen the document artificially.
“Now that we have explained how stakeholder participation improves internal company processes, we can examine the most important ways that stakeholders interact with a company.”
“Thus far, this report has examined the need for greater fiscal control, the need for clear direction from leadership, and the need for improved accountability practices. The need for improved flexibility, which will be discussed next, is no less important.”
“Similar to the idea that students are capable of high academic achievement is the idea that students are capable of civil social interactions.”
Introduction
Welcome to the Precise Edit Training Manual. The manual offers practical writing advice and strategies for practical people. Each chapter provides a full discussion of strategies we employ and problems we fix. Of the 29 chapters, 15 provide comprehensive advice for writing clearly and effectively, and 14 demonstrate how we solve issues with punctuation, grammar, and word usage.
Writers from across the globe and benefited from the Precise Edit Training Manual, and have consistently expressed the usefulness of this important writing guide.
Written concisely in plain English with examples for each topic, the manual is an incredible and inexpensive tool writers of all abilities should possess. --Gary Hawk
Free lifetime updates as they become available.
It Is What It Is (Starting sentences with it)
It’s a bad habit to start sentences with it. It causes your readers to pause momentarily while they figure out what it is. It makes your sentences clumsy. It is true that doing so is an easy way to write a sentence, but usually it is not good writing. It even becomes a bit annoying when you do it too often. It is bad to annoy your reader.
Starting sentences with it is a bad habit. Your readers will need to pause momentarily while they figure out what it is, and your sentences will be clumsy. Writing this way may be easy, but starting sentences with it is usually not a good idea. If you do this too often, you may annoy your readers, which is never a good idea.
1. Problems Caused by Starting Sentences with It
a. Buried
subject:
In most sentences starting with it, the real
subject is buried somewhere later in the sentence. By real subject,
we don’t mean the noun or pronoun performing the verb in the
predicate, which is called the grammatical subject. We mean
the person, idea, place, or thing that is the focus of the sentence,
which is called the rhetorical subject. Consider this (poor)
sentence:
It is a real challenge to find a good deal on a car.
In this sentence, it is serving as the grammatical subject because this word is in the subject place followed by the verb is. But what is this sentence about? It is about finding a good deal. [Note: We are willing to start this sentence with it because we have already told you what it is--this sentence.] Finding a good deal, therefore, is the rhetorical subject. When we put the rhetorical subject in the place of the grammatical subject, we get
To find a good deal on a car is a real challenge.
This can be further simplified to read
Finding a good deal on a car is a real challenge.
Now the grammatical subject and the rhetorical subject are the same. The sentence is more direct, and the reader immediately knows what we are writing about without having to wait, even momentarily, to figure out what it is.
On the other hand, let’s say you and your buddies are comparing all the daring, challenging things you have done in your lives. Everyone’s life seems so exciting compared to your boring, unadventurous life. You want to prove that you are exciting, too, so you want to emphasize the challenge of finding a good deal on a car. In this case, you could rewrite the sentence as:
A real challenge is finding a good deal on a car.
(Oh, boy! That will
really show them who’s boss.) They may still doubt your derring-do,
but they won’t doubt your ability to write well. With this sentence
construction, the rhetorical and grammatical subjects are the same,
as in the revisions above.
Fix 1: Make sure the rhetorical
subject is also the grammatical subject--at the start of the
sentence.
b.
Redundancy:
Precise Edit has a very firm rule about
redundancy: Remove it. By redundancy we mean writing 2 or more
words/phrases/clauses/etc. that have the same meaning. As seen in the
discussion of the first problem, using it to start sentences
has the added problem of two subjects (grammatical and rhetorical)
that mean the same thing: It means finding a good deal on a
car. We only need one of these. Of course, we want to use the
more specific subject, not the vague it, which has no meaning
by itself. When we place the rhetorical subject in the position of
the grammatical subject, we are left with only one subject, and the
redundancy has been removed.
Fix 1 (again): Make sure the
rhetorical subject is also the grammatical subject--at the start of
the subject.
Sometimes it is buried in the sentence and still causes this redundancy. Consider this sentence:
We don’t like it when writing is redundant.
In this case, it
means when writing is redundant. To remove this redundancy,
ask: What is it? You will answer: redundant writing.
We
get rid of it and add the answer to the question. Now we have
We don’t like redundant writing.
Removing the redundancy
has produced a far more economical and graceful sentence.
Fix
2: Remove redundant words and simplify the details.
c. Context
confusion:
Sometimes, the word it is used when the
writer (or speaker) doesn’t know what the subject is, doesn’t
want to reveal it, or thinks it is already clear. Of course, from the
reader’s perspective, the sentence may lose all meaning. The
problem here is one of context. By context we mean the topic
in which the sentence exists (i.e., what the sentence is about). The
subject of a sentence, indeed, the entire sentence, needs to refer to
the context, and using it may not do that. If someone asks
you,
Do
you like this car?
and you answer,
It is really nice.
your listener will know what you are talking about. He or she already knows the context of your statement: the quality of the car.
However, if you walk into a colleague’s office and say,
It is difficult for me.
you might get a strange look in response. Your colleague doesn’t know what you are talking about and might ask, “What is?” He or she is confused, rightly so, and you will need to explain the context of your statement. Instead, you could have originally said,
Making coffee is difficult for me.
You may still get a
strange look, but at least your colleague knows what you are talking
about.
Fix 3: Make sure the subject refers to the context of
the sentence.
2. Burying It
You have to be careful with your revisions. The word it might be buried in the sentence and still cause the same problems. Consider this sentence:
You know it is bad to tease angry dogs.
This sentence doesn’t start with it, but it suffers from problems 1 and 2. You might consider how this sentence comprises one primary sentence and an embedded sentence. The primary sentence is You know, and the embedded sentence is It is bad to tease angry dogs. The embedded sentence has the problem, but it can be revised to read
Teasing angry dogs is bad.
The entire sentence will now read
You know [that] teasing angry dogs is bad.
(Hmm. We may now have a
problem with the tone. If the person already knows this bit of
wisdom, why are we saying it? Admitting that he or she already knows
this seems a bit condescending. If we must make this statement at
all, perhaps we should simply say
Teasing angry dogs is bad
and pretend that this is new information.)
3. Some Fun (?) Examples
It is clear to me that our main problem is the inability to fly without wings.
Our main problem is the inability to fly without wings.
[Since you said this, it must be clear to you! Saying It is clear to me is redundant.]
It was a dark and stormy night.
The night was stormy.
[It means dark and stormy night, and most nights are dark.]
It only happens once every 70 years. Tomorrow night Halley’s Comet will appear.
Halley’s Comet only appears once every 70 years, but it will appear tomorrow night.
[This solves the context problem of the first sentence.]
It is a nice car you have in your driveway.
You have a nice car in your driveway.
[An even better solution might be A nice car is in your driveway, but this seems to lose the idea of ownership.]
Some people like it when the traffic lights aren’t working because they can drive right through it.
Some people like broken traffic lights because they can drive right through the intersection.
[We would be very amused to see someone drive through the light!]
Which Word Do I Use?
A Quickie Guide to the Most Confusing Word Pairs
This book does not contain every confusing word pair. That would be more information than most people need. Rather, this e-book addresses the most common word pair problems. If you master these words, you will solve most word usage problems. Learn to use these words so you don't have to keep looking them up, and so you can be confident about your writing.
You will learn to use these word pairs correctly: accept/except; all ready/already; all right/alright; although/while; anxious/eager; because/as; between/among; compose/comprise; continuous/continual; effect/affect; everybody/every body; farther/further; good/well; hopeful/hopefully; i.e./e.g.; if/whether; in/on; lay/lie; less/fewer; like/such as; realize/think/believe/feel; skim/scan; that/which; was/were; who/that; who/whom.
Based on nearly 20 years of editing clients' documents, these are the word pairs that confuse most people. This handy guide will help you write professionally and say what you mean.
That vs. Which
Mistakes using that and which are probably the most common grammar problems we fix.
To understand how to use that, you need to understand restrictive phrases. It’s not too difficult, actually. Think of a category of things, such as cars at a repair shop or trees surrounding a house. A restrictive phrase focuses the reader’s attention on particular items in a category, such as one specific car or tree. Consider this sentence.
“The car that is being repaired needs new brakes.”
Based on this sentence, multiple cars exist, but we want to identify one particular car: the car “that is being repaired.” In this way, we restrict, or limit, the reader’s attention from all the cars to one particular car. Here is another example.
“We removed the tree that was struck by lightning.”
Here, multiple trees exist. We want to restrict the reader’s attention from all the trees to one particular tree: the tree “that was struck by lightning.”
Here’s the simple rule for remembering this. If you need to tell the reader which one, use that, not which.
To understand how to use which, you need to understand non-restrictive phrases. A non-restrictive phrase provides additional information about some noun. The information is not essential for the reader to know which thing you are describing. It can be removed from the sentence, and the reader will still know what you are talking about. Consider this sentence.
“Legal counsel approved the brief, which was well written.”
In this sentence, we already know which brief we are discussing. The information “which was well written” provides an additional description of “brief.” The phrase is not essential to the meaning. Thus, “which was well written” is a non-restrictive phrase.
Remember to set the non-restrictive phrase apart from the rest of the sentence with commas. If you forget the commas, your grammar check may suggest adding them. Be careful, though. The real problem may be that you don’t need which but that.
For example, if we had written
“Legal counsel approved the brief that was well written,”
then we know that legal counsel considered multiple briefs but only approved the well-written one. “That was well written” is a restrictive phrase because it tells us which brief was approved.
As you can see, that and which communicate different information. Using the correct word helps you communicate accurately.
Here’s the simple rule. If the reader already knows which one, use which. If you need to tell the reader which one, use that.
Good vs. Well
If I had a dollar for every time I had to correct this error…
Good is an adjective. This means that we can use it to describe a person, place, thing, or concept. In short, like all adjectives, good is used to describe a noun. It cannot be used correctly to describe an action, which is the most common error.
CORRECT: The good
dog barked. (Good is describing the dog.)
CORRECT: This
pie is good! (Good is describing the
pie.)
CORRECT: She had a good idea. (Good is
describing the idea.)
Well is an adverb. This means that it can be used to describe an action (verb), an adjective, or another adverb. I have never seen someone use well to describe a thing.
INCORRECT: The man
sings good. (Good cannot be used to describe the action of
singing.)
CORRECT: The man sings well. (Well is
describing the action of singing.)
INCORRECT: The music was played good. (Good cannot be used to describe the action of playing.)
CORRECT: The music was played well. (Well is describing the action of playing.)
The error that I see is people using good to describe an action. Remember, you have a good thing. You do it well. Here’s the sentence I use to remember the difference:
Good writers write well.
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