“Never call a stomach a tummy without good reason.”

“Rather, very, little, pretty -- these are the leeches that infest the pond of prose, sucking the blood of words. The constant use of the adjective little (except to indicate size) is particularly debilitating; we should all try to do a little better, we should all be very watchful of this rule, for it is a rather important one, and we are pretty sure to violate it now and then. ”

“Rich, ornate prose is hard to digest, generally unwholesome, and sometimes nauseating.”

“...when a sentence is made stronger, it usually becomes shorter. Thus, brevity is a by-product of vigor.”

“Instead of announcing what you are about to tell is interesting, make it so.”

“Young writers often suppose that style is a garnish for the meat of prose, a sauce by which a dull dish is made palatable. Style has no such entity; it is nondetachable, unfilterable.”

“Wilbur never forgot Charlotte. Although he loved her children and grandchildren dearly, none of the new spiders ever quite took her place in his heart. She was in a class by herself. It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.”