Adrian Shaughnessy's rather splendid-looking collection of essays, Scratching the Surface, has just landed on my desk. Whilst having an initial flick-through, a brief editorial note caught my eye: Shaughnessy credits George Orwell’s six rules of good writing (originally published in his essay Politics and the English Language) as the door that enabled him to progress a a writer – “my writing is always poorer when I forget one or more of them”. They are:

Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
Never use a long word where a short one will do.
If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
Never use the passive where you can use the active.
Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

I rather like them in their common-sense simplicity (even the ironic superfluous “always” in three). Almost like the word version of Dieter Rams' ubiquitous ten principles for good design. Get rid of all the junk and get straight to the point. Only what is necessary. I like that.