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59 words is a lot of freaking words. Especially when you only have 559 to start with... Stupid 500 word limit!!

Any tips on staying under those pesky word limits?

TIP: Show it to someone else.

QUOTE: "If I'd had more time, I would have written less."

(Probably butchered that one... think it was Twain.)

use more contractions! lol...

also try reading aloud.... look for places you stumble on phrases that dont sound natural and easy (i.e. are too convoluted); filler phrasing that could be said in fewer words; lengthy transitions that can be conveyed with a word, punctuation or a line break

or paste it here and maybe someone bored at a desk somewhere can help?

Yeah, I think I need to walk away and then come back and read it aloud.

I wish I could just use contractions!! It was drilled into my head so long ago that contractions are evil, I simply cannot bring myself to use them in published/formal writing!!

I prioritize the paragraphs by their significance to the topic. As some semi-famous writer dude said... ya gotta slaughter your darlings.

500 words is right at 3/4 of a page if memory serves... Go by the key thoughts instead of paragraphs. Break them into pieces and find the "Weak stuff" and toss those bits out.

If that doesnt work, read it outloud and find contradictions and spots that cause you to pause.

Hope that helps...

Somebody else said, "Brevity is the soul of wit." I think its a bit funnier when you catch someone in their briefs... but that isnt very witty. Dressing or undressing... streaker!

Edit: Might try posting it here, somebody will kill it for you...

Who are you writing for?
If it's for a website, consumer mag, etc. I'm pretty sure contractions are preferred.

Take out every "very," use contractions, slash half your adjectives...you get the point.

Lastly, how are you counting your words? If half your words are "it," "and," "in," etc. your count may be off. (Unless of course your editor specifically told you to cut 59 words. )

I once had to butcher a 2500 word article down to 1000 words. It was like cutting off a limb. I literally had to go through it a dozen times, reworking the entire piece each time. In the end...well, I thought it sucked compared to the original longer version but it got printed. And that's pretty much all that counts.


Good luck.

Interesting - in the English speaking world the limit for a text is given as the number of words? The German publishers will tell you not to exceed a certain number of characters.

Kathrin: I think that for the majority of N.American publishers the goal is to provide a rough constraint for the writer rather than set specific limits. Fine tuning of the piece when it comes to fitting it into a book or magazine layout is done with things like the type of font used, letter-spacing, and general page layout. Ie: the number of pull-quotes and images, the size of the title and deck, whether to add a side-bar or not, etc.

Markus, that's the same with German publications.
My personal explanation of this phenomenon is based on the structure of the German language: In German, we have those wonderful compound words that can become very very VERY long - it's possible to invent words of infinite length by adding another and another and another component. A single word can consist of 2 or 20 or 50 or 100 or more letters if the author wants, so it's hard to judge the length of a text by the number of words. Limiting the number of characters (including blanks) is preciser.

59 words may not be SO bad but cut a few sentences and it'll be fine. I wouldn't worry too mcuh if you're over a little....

quote:

Originally posted by Kathrin:
In German, we have those wonderful compound words that can become very very VERY long

Heh, I'd quite forgotten about that. I remember seeing a sign in Germany that had the equivalent of something like "please cross the street and use the other sidewalk" all as one long German word.

quote:

Originally posted by Tracy Ann:
I wish I could just use contractions!! It was drilled into my head so long ago that contractions are evil, I simply cannot bring myself to use them in published/formal writing!!

If you're working with a word limit then you must have a specific publication in mind. If that publication is a magazine or a collection by a publisher that has similar items on the shelves already, then a key strategy is to pick up back issues and see what they like to publish. Contractions are used quite heavily in many magazines these days and if you open up an issue of the publication you're pitching and see contractions all over the place, then you could even run the risk of having your work sound too formal for their tastes if you've left them out.


I think there is too much stale advice floating around the internet these days. I found several wonderful sites proclaiming the one true way to format your manuscript (12pt monospaced fonts, double spaced, no paragraph indents, etc) and then spoke to some editors who said that they don't care about format... as long as it's not some whacky font on pink paper. This whole 'never use contractions' business falls into the same area for me. I think the main importance is what the publication wants and whether you can cater your work to their tastes.

I recently handed off a couple of 400 word pieces. MAN, was that painful. And I'm standing by for another edit on a new piece, just waiting to find out how much I have to cut. It's painful, to be sure. But I'm also finding it's doable if I keep looking. Once you've trimmed to your absolute limit, hand it to someone you trust with the knife...

Writing small tight pieces has an advantage, it can make you a better writer.

I just had to describe and explain an entire huge, beautiful 18th century church in no more than 6.000 characters. Sigh! But I made it in 5.991!!!

A text is like the author's child, and proud parents don't notice their children's flaws. Cutting down one's baby hurts, it still hurts even if it's the 50th or 100th text. But it's possible.

Read lots of Hemingway. If you can write in even double the number of words he did, you're doing well.

But it's true that writing short pieces is far harder than writing long ones. You have to get good at figuring out what the core points are and scratching anything that's superfluous. (And using words like superfluous sparingly...)

Read a few American women's magazines and that will give you some good style lessons. Apparently any sentence over 15 words is WAY too long.

It helps to think of word limits as your friend, rather than as a nuisance.

Think of it as a diet. You're bloated and beefy and so you go to some crazy drill seargent who makes you work your ass off. You resent him being there, but in the end, he makes you smooth and aerodynamic.

Also remember what Hemmingway said about world limits: "When you write, you have to kill your babies."

There are tricks, but embrace this: 59 words out of 559 is easy. You can take 10% out of almost anything and not miss it.

Many suggestions above are good. Consider these, too. First, look at you IDEAS. Are they in the right order? You can waste incredible numbers of words with clumsy transitions, etc. Do all of your words work toward conveying those ideas? At 500 words, you must communicate directly. Use active voice. Remove all throat-clearing. Remember what your point is, and excise all words that do not move the reader toward that point. Oh, and your cute jokes--you probably don't need all of them. Really. Sorry. Five hundred words is short.