Good writing is lean and confident. Don't describe an event as rather spectacular or very awesome. Every little qualifier whittles away some fraction of the reader's trust.

-William Zinsser, On Writing Well

Comments: Almost every student makes the mistake he identifies: "Don't hedge your prose with little timidities." Words are strong. If you believe something deserves the word spectacular or awesome, tacking on "rather" or "very" weakens those words. This seems like a small point. But it's important. As Zinsser points out, you lose your reader's trust: "Readers want a writer who believes in himself and in what he is saying." That applies to a college essay, a sales email, a legal brief.

Specificity is Authentic

Specificity suggests that you know what you are talking about.

Example: “Don't get me wrong: I love the restaurant business. Hell, I'm still in the restaurant business - a lifetime, classically trained chef who, an hour from now, will probably be roasting bones for demi-glace and butchering beef tenderloins in a cellar prep kitchen on lower Park Avenue."

—Bourdain, kitchen confidential

Comments: Anthony could write. Study that paragraph. You can hear him, right? It’s not just the specifics. Look how he uses italics, a (slightly) edgy word like “hell”… he sounds like a human.

Sewer roaches, according to Terminex. Blattaria implacablus or something. Really huge roaches. Armored-vehicle-type bugs. Totally black, with Kevlar-type cases, the works. And fearless, raised in the Hobbesian sewers down there. These Southwest sewer roaches you turn on the light and they just look up at you from the tile like: 'You got a problem?'

—David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest, 1996

Comments: Why is this good writing? What can we learn from DFW writing about cockroaches? I think a lot.

1. Originality: You've never heard anyone write about a cockroach like this. DFW took the time to look at a cockroach, think about what he saw, and describe it to us in fresh, honest, accurate words.
   1. Do the same in your writing: Don't borrow the timeworn metaphors of other writers. Create your own images.
2. Topic: DFW could have written about anything. But he decided to take the time to describe a cockroach. And he does it in a way that's novel, funny, memorable.
   1. Do the same in your writing: Sometimes the most interesting writing describes an ordinary subject, but in an extraordinary way.
3. Voice: You can hear DFW's voice in this writing, right? How does he pull that off? He even drops some Latin jargon on us. But we don't mind. Because he's using common slang like "the works" and imagining a cockroach confronting us like a character in a Scorsese movie.
   1. Do the he same in your writing: Don't be afraid to write the way you speak; to have fun with your writing; to mix some fancy Latin term with the specific name of a pest-control company.