Small words are powerful words. They do their job well with grace and beauty that big words often lack. "Old simple words are best", said Sir Winston Churchill, master of plain words. They go straight-like bullets from a rifle.
Bruce Burton tells his copywriters: "Say it simply; say it in one-syllable words." William Cullen Bryant, when he was editor of the old New York Evening Post, used to tell writers: "Never use long words when short ones will do. Call a spade by its name, not a well-known instrument of manual labour. Let home be a home and not a residence. Speak of a place, not a locality." "Big men", it is said, "use little words, little men big words."
Small words are faster to write, faster to read and are easier to understand. They are forceful, they are direct and they are action words. They express your thoughts fast and without confusion. This is not to say that you should banish big words from your vocabulary. If the right word is a big word, go ahead and use it. But if a short word does the job, use it. Small words endear themselves-by their tininess.
Many English proverbs are full of single syllables: "Where there"s a will, there's a way.' "A stitch in time saves nine." "A bird in hand is worth two in the bush."
Shakespeare's stock of small words is amazing, and nobody wrote more plainly than Nobel Laureate Hemingway did. One-syllable words just flowed from his pen. And with his tiny, terse words he gave English a punch and writing is still reeling.
Sir Winston Churchill stirred people with small words. When England faced the threat of invasion by German troops, he addressed the British people in these plain words: "I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat." And the British people responded. He did not begin his broadcast on 17 June 1940: "The position in regard to France is extremely serious." He began, "The news from France is very bad." He did not end it: "We have absolute confi dence that eventually the situation will be restored." He ended: "We are sure that in the end all will come right."
Said Mark Twain: "I never write metropolis for seven cents, because I can get the same price for city. I never write policeman, because I get the same money for cop."
