ClearTips: Powerful paragraphs

Stick to one subject

If all the sentences in a paragraph are about one person, one idea, one country, try using the same noun or pronoun as the subject of each sentence.

Here is a paragraph with a new subject for each sentence:

In 1956 Endicott Peabody stood for election as attorney general of Massachusetts. Victory was not his. Next was a (failed) run at the Democratic nomination for the governorship of the state. Then the United States Senate candidacy-another loss. Hence the move to New Hampshire, with unsuccessful attempts for both houses of Congress. Endicott Peabody's record of honourable failure was briefly interrupted in 1962 when, after a lengthy recount of the votes, he was elected governor of Massachusetts. But two years later defeat was again the victor.

Compare that with Endicott Peabody as the subject for all sentences but one:

In 1956 Endicott Peabody stood for election as attorney general of Massachusetts. He lost. In 1958 he stood again, and again lost. In 1960 he sought the Democratic nomination for the governorship of the state, and failed. In 1966 he was a candidate for the United States Senate, and lost. In the 1980s he moved to New Hampshire and tried for both houses of Congress, but, sadly, lost again. Endicott Peabody's record of honourable failure was briefly interrupted in 1962 when, after a lengthy recount of the votes, he was elected governor of Massachusetts. But two years later he was defeated.

The new subject of the next-to-the-last sentence works because it signals Peabody's sole victory.

Two more examples:

Unbiased outsiders might blame languages, bad products and state intervention. (Britain's music and publishing industries, not hampered in these ways, compete head-to-head with America's.) They might admit that Hollywood's libraries and worldwide distribution system give it a head start. But they would also note that when Europe produces films intended to please audiences as well as critics ("Four Weddings and a Funeral", for instance) it can do surprisingly well. And they would note too (as many in Hollywood do) that Tinseltown's bloated costs leave it surprisingly vulnerable to commercial competition. None of these thoughts has occurred to the lunatics running the EU's art asylum.

Gertrude Stein was not the stereotypical poor and alienated intellectual who was an enemy of capitalism. She always had a comfortable income, derived from her inheritance and supplemented after she turned 60 by her publishing royalties. She also had great investments-in Picassos, Matisses, and other paintings. Far from being alienated, she was the internationally recognized grande dame of a group of rising geniuses. And she was not an intellectual, having little interest in general ideas about economics or politics. "The real ideas," she said, "are not the relation of human beings as groups but a human being to himself inside him and that is an idea that is more interesting than humanity in groups."

Note how both paragraphs join equally weighted supporting sentences with also and and.

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