How to Edit Sentences for Meaning

I took a course in college called "Rhetoric." In this course we learned to dissect the meaning of every sentence in a paragraph.

I still remember the exercise - it was so brilliant - yet so simple (as most good ideas are I suppose!)

Here's what it was:

You print out a page of text you wrote.

Then you get a blank piece of lined paper.

Now you go one line at a time, starting from the top and write down the essence/meaning of each sentence on one line. You can't go over a line.

When you finish a paragraph you look at your lines meanings and you can instantly see which sentecens you should keep as is, which ones can be trimmed down, and which ones should go!

It doesn't seem like you could get all this from such a simplistic exercise - but I swear it works!

Sincerely,
CB Webmaster

Links to Sites to Improve Your Writing!

How to Write Clearly so People Understand what You're Saying!

Find Your Writing Voice

How to Write Concisely

How to Edit Sentences for Meaning

Revising Prose

Online Writing Assistance

Sentence Diagramming

How to Research What You Want to Write About

How to Outline

A Guide To Writing in English: Easily Confused Words

Rhetoric

A little ditty I wrote...

Okay I wrote this about 10 years ago but it still comes to my mind every Thanksgiving - thought I'd share it with the world - maybe I'll post an audio file so you can hear the melody. Oh BTW I originally created it for a family skit - imagine kids dancing around shaking their tailfeathers and you've got the pic lol :)

Gobble Gobble Gobble
Gobble Gobble Gobble
Gobble Gobble Gobble
A turkey I am

Gobble Gobble Gobble
Gobble Gobble Gobble
Gobble Gobble Gobble
A turkey I am

Turkeys are funny
Turkeys are yummy
Turkeys taste good
in your little tummy
You'll be so full
you won't have any
room for cranberry jelly!

Gobble Gobble Gobble
Gobble Gobble Gobble
A turkey I am

Gobble Gobble Gobble
Gobble Gobble Gobble
Gobble Gobble Gobble
A turkey I am

Okay here's the audio.

Screenplays Posing Questions

There's this interesting article about how screenplay writing boils down to one thing: Asking the audience questions. Check out the article:

http://www.geocities.com/carolinerocks/scp.html