As I looked on at the pandemonium caused by my false alarm, I was inexplicably reminded of George Orwell. A little back story here. I was attending a friend’s wedding and while waiting for the ceremony to begin, I happened to look out the window and saw the bride running in the courtyard. An involuntary gasp left my mouth which alerted everyone else of the situation.

Everyone panicked and ran to the courtyard to see what was happening and what we saw was really embarrassing for me as it clearly wasn’t the bride but her sister. The colored windows had distorted the color of her dress which made me think she was wearing a bridal gown. The bridesmaid was clearly distressed, and I was so embarrassed that I just ran away from the venue. I later sent an apology letter to the happy couple, but I am too mortified to face them just yet. I have nothing to blame though, but the colorfully decorated windows which distorted the colors, which brings me back to Mr. Orwell.

George Orwell was an English novelist who is famous for his novels “1984” and “Animal Farm”. He once said, “Good prose is like a windowpane”. Decorated and colorful windows may be beautiful to look at, but a simple and clear windowpane serves its actual purpose of illumination. Similarly, decorative writing with excessive adjectives and adverbs, and complex sentence structure may make your writing look fancy, but your reader will struggle to understand your message which can lead to confusion similar to the situation mentioned above.

Thus, clarity in business writing must be regarded with utmost importance. You are writing to business people who receive tons of similar correspondences daily and do not have the time to sort through your fancy writing to gauge your meaning. There is a strong chance that they will just ignore your letter which can cause you to lose an important client.

Sharpen your writing skills and learn more about writing clearly and concisely with the EPiC Business Writing course.

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Source: https://orwell.ru/library/essays/wiw/english/e_wiw