Top Highlights

• Most research, however, turns out to be irrelevant to the paper you finally write, which is another reason to mix writing with the researching early.
• Writers of English Prose (1943 and later editions); and Joseph M. Williams, Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace (1981; 12th ed., with Joseph Bizup, 2016).
• you get stuck, write a sub-outline, a narrower outline about the points you are going to write in the next few sentences or paragraphs, checking off the points mentally as you write. (Never
• Arrangement finds good outlines, from the level of the book down to the level of the paragraph. Later you should play around with the arrangement, moving whole paragraphs or sections around until they fit into a logic or a story.
• The guiding question in research (research, or invention, is not the main subject here, but no extra charge) is So What? Answer that question in every sentence, and you will become a great scholar, or a millionaire. Answer it once or twice in a ten-page paper or report, and you’ll write a pretty good one.