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What Are the Best Ways to Expand Your Vocabulary?

By Roy Peter Clark

I know so many writers who begin to question themselves when they encounter another writer who seems to have a much richer vocabulary. I know I do. When I read my first book by the late David Foster Wallace, I was astonished by how many powerful and interesting words were available to him -- and seemingly unavailable to me.

But anytime I face such a problem, I look to other writers for solutions. From research and practice, I've compiled a list of 10 ways to enrich your reading and writing vocabularies.

George Orwell argued that we should never use a long word when a short one will do. Shakespeare, I've recently learned, had a writing vocabulary of about 25,000 words, twice that of his nearest rival. And the Anglo-Saxon poets used to refer to their poetic language coming from a "word hoard" using similar language for the hoarding of gold. The word Thesaurus means "treasure."

So, yes, words, even the dullest, are gems in the right setting. Join us for a chat Thursday, May 20, at 3 p.m. ET, and let's see what we can do to fill up our treasure chests. 

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You can revisit this link at any time to replay the chat after it has ended.

Full post as published by Writing Tools on May 19, 2010 (boomark / email).