Excellent article on CopyBlogger asking Are Vampire Words are Sucking the Life Out of your Writing? The topic pertains very much to speeches too.
I would add the word “thing” to the list for speeches. ”Thing” is such a non-descriptive word. There’s always a better word than “thing” that describes the subject of your attention.
Posted under Public Speaking
This post was written by john on September 1, 2009
How could I have forgotton “thing”? It’s the bane of my fiction-writing at the moment, and you’re right, there’s always an alternative (it just sometimes takes some head-scratching to find the best one).
And great point on applying my tips to speeches, I’ll have to keep this in mind myself! I’m off to my second ever Toastmaster’s meeting next week (and strongly thinking about joining as a member) so speech-writing and delivery is likely to be on my agenda in the future…
That’s the thing about “thing”
Good luck with Toastmasters. It is a fantastic organization. I recommend using table topics as a way to explore your fiction-writing.