Of The Maker's Eye: Reviewing Your Own Manuscripts, By Donald Murray

Donald Murray's "The Maker's Eye: Reviewing Your Own Manuscripts, an excerpt from Writer (1973), and William Zinsser's "Simplicity", an excerpt from On Writing Well (1976), both argue that excessive verbiage and cluttered language do more harm than good. While Murray states this in passing to illustrate the importance of revision, Zinsser chooses to make his essay focus entirely on the matter. Murray uses a plethora of other author's opinions to reinforce his point, trading concision for additional evidence. Contrarily, Zinsser only uses four quotes, two to show excessive verbiage, one to show a simple and effective statement, and another to show that he is not alone in his belief. Where Murray draws out his essay to make it clear why simple

Murray sets aside a paragraph for each component that writers look for in their drafts, "information", "meaning", "audience", "form", "structure", "development", "dimension", and "voice" (228-229). Each paragraph is brief, only covering the basics of the subject, but serve the greater purpose of being unnecessary. Murray deliberately makes this portion inconsequential in order to illustrate the importance of editing. Immediately afterward, Murray's words become interesting and involved, telling you only what you need to know. As Murray puts it, "Each sentence, each line, each clause, each phrase, each word, each mark of punctuation, each section of white space between the type has to contribute to the clarification of meaning."

His idea is simple and easy to understand, ". . . the secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its clearest components." (234). This idea is exemplified throughout his essay, he keeps every sentence as clean as possible, ensuring the reader can understand his intent. Zinsser asks two important questions when writing, ". . . what am I trying to say?" (235) and ". . . have I said it?" (235). Both of these questions ensure clear arguments and concise writing. In contrast to Zinsser's punctual and effective essay, Murray's long and dolorous work emphasizes drab and uninteresting writing. That said, both seek to prove the same thing: brevity is most effective. When Murray gives the reader a plethora of unneeded detail it feels droning and dull but, when he shifts to writing with punctuality, the essay captivates the reader. Similarly, Zinsser aims to make the same case through different means. With Zinsser's approach, clarity is placed above all else, any unnecessary information or unneeded word is replaced or excised from the