Take a bus ride to Iowa

Kurt Vonnegut and David Ogilvy on writing to be understood                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 June 19, 2023 | [Read Online]( Take a bus ride to Iowa Kurt Vonnegut and David Ogilvy on writing to be understood [Cole Schafer]( June 19, 2023 [fb]( [tw]( [in]( [email](mailto:?subject=Post%20from%20The%20Process.&body=Take%20a%20bus%20ride%20to%20Iowa%3A%20Kurt%20Vonnegut%20and%20David%20Ogilvy%20on%20writing%20to%20be%20understood%0A%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fwww.getthesticky.com%2Fp%2Fiowa) Kurt Vonnegut wrote with a razor thing dictionary, making use of wordplay that could be read and understood by the masses. The father of [Slaughterhouse 5]( blamed the simplicity of his prose on his old stomping grounds… “ I myself grew up in Indianapolis, where common speech sounds like a band saw cutting galvanized tin, and employs a vocabulary as unornamental as a monkey wrench. ” Wielding his band saw, Vonnegut was able to describe the ornamental worlds he thought-up whilst penning science fiction with language as unornamental as, well, monkey wrench. While David Ogilvy wrote within a completely different genre than Vonnegut, he shared the novelist’s sentiments. When Ogilvy felt one of his copywriters at Ogilvy & Mather was getting too fancy with their word use, he gave them the following advice… “ Get on the bus. Go to Iowa. Stay on a farm for a week and talk to the farmer. Come back to New York by train and talk to your fellow passengers in the day-coach. If you still want to use the word, go ahead. ” In closing, if you’re writing or creating something that requires a dictionary or an interpreter to understand, take a bus ride to Iowa. By [Cole Schafer](. P.S. If this newsletter left you feeling inspired, do me a huge favor and tell one person to [subscribe](. [tw]( [ig]( [in]( Update your email preferences or unsubscribe [here]( © The Process 228 Park Ave S, #29976, New York, New York 10003, United States [[beehiiv logo]Powered by beehiiv](