by Richard Subber | Jun 30, 2026 | Language, Tidbits
“…Go and tell the guy what you want.”
The wisdom of David Mackenzie Ogilvy (1911-1999)
This is trenchant advice on how to write well—still relevant almost 45 years after it was written by David Ogilvy, who was renowned in the late 20th century as “The Father of Modern Advertising.”
Now, to be sure, Ogilvy’s legendary sway in the ad biz was recognized in pre-internet, pre-wired, pre-Twitter days when ad copy was deemed more salient and more powerful than ad buzz.
Indeed, Ogilvy’s famous memo “How To Write” was circulated far beyond the Mad Men-world of his agency, Ogilvy & Mather, after he wrote it on September 7, 1982.
Here it is:
- Read the Roman-Raphaelson book on writing. Read it three times.
- Write the way you talk. Naturally.
- Use short words, short sentences and short paragraphs.
- Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass.
- Never write more than two pages on any subject.
- Check your quotations.
- Never send a letter or a memo on the day you write it. Read it aloud the next morning—and then edit it.
- If it is something important, get a colleague to improve it.
- Before you send your letter or your memo, make sure it is crystal clear what you want the recipient to do.
- If you want ACTION, don’t write. Go and tell the guy what you want.
At this point, I know I shouldn’t embarrass myself by trying to reconceptualize or translate Ogilvy’s observations for you…
OK, I can’t resist this one: I think Item 10 is the best. In today’s wired world this can be translated to “If you want to reach an agreement or have an argument, don’t send a text or email when you can call the other party or talk face-to-face.”
Note: the reference in Item 1 is to a now-standard work by Kenneth Roman and Joel Raphaelson, Writing That Works: How to Communicate Effectively in Business. A 3rd edition was issued in 2000.
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Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2026 All rights reserved.
Book review: Shantung Compound
They didn’t care much
about each other…
by Langdon Gilkey
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My first name was rain: A dreamery of poems with 52 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Jun 28, 2026 | Theater and play reviews
weeping in silence…
Movie review:
Chinatown
Chinatown is a see-it-again confirmation of the finality of sadness that can’t be undone.
Jack Nicholson is the in-your-face private detective, Jake Gittes, and Faye Dunaway is Evelyn Mulwray, the desperately unhappy wife-mother who seems to be everybody’s victim—both of them in Oscar-nominee performances.
Chinatown (1974, rated R, 130 minutes) mostly doesn’t take place in Chinatown—the story could happen anywhere. There is enough of intrigue, and enough of human failing, and enough of human courage. There is ambition, and yearning, and avarice, and benevolence, and hints of love.
It is a tantalizing story about people you don’t want to be, and people you hope may achieve better lives, and people who must finally face the reality of life on the wrong track.
At the end you will be weeping in silence.
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Movie review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2026 All rights reserved.
Book review: “The Gentle Boy”
The Puritans had a dark side…
by Nathaniel Hawthorne
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Above all: Poems of dawn and more with 74 free verse poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Jun 9, 2026 | Human Nature, My poetry, Poetry, Reflections
heartbeats on display
allegro
The boy was bouncing,
hopping, jumping,
he was on the move,
kids make their world a motion,
an energy,
a swirl,
they test their arms,
and legs,
and fingers,
and their voices,
and their faces,
and ways to look around
and through their spaces,
and sounds that are new words
in their worlds,
they do not share
their racing thoughts,
but they put their heartbeats on display,
their disporting has no end.
Do you remember that part of you
is a child?
Will you let that part of you
bounce with joy?
Your inner child wants to jump,
now.
March 28, 2026
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My poetry. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2026 All rights reserved.
The Reader (Der Vorleser)
Not just a rehash of WWII…
by Bernhard Schlink
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In other words: Poems for your eyes and ears with 64 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
Your comments are welcome—tell me what you’re thinking.
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by Richard Subber | Jun 4, 2026 | American history, History, Tidbits
It’s a good story, at least…
“The most valuable of all talents is that of
never using two words
when one will do.”
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
3rd President of the United States
He was a Republican when it was rather democratic to be a Republican.
The historical record doesn’t really suggest that Jefferson was as tight-lipped as this maxim implies.
Perhaps it would be more meaningful for ordinary folks like us if he had said something like “don’t use 38 words when a few of them, well-chosen, will do the job.”
Furthermore, let’s keep in mind the contemplative observation by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) that praiseworthy prose and poetry—and in general, talking—has a lot to do with using “the best words.”
‘nuff said.
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Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2026 All rights reserved.
Book review: The Comanche Empire
the other story of the American West…
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many waters: more poems with 53 free verse poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | May 31, 2026 | Human Nature, Theater and play reviews
many splendored smiles…
Movie review:
Carol
starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara
Cate Blanchett has a many-splendored smile. You see several of them in Carol (2015, rated R, 118 minutes).
Blanchett’s smile is deep, almost inexplicably alluring, enduring, and profoundly feminine. Sexy? You decide.
Rooney Mara is an almost new pair of eyes for me (think The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo). She uses her face like Blanchett does: her face exalts her feelings, you wouldn’t mind seeing it on a stadium-size screen.
Carol is a 1950s-era exploration of how two ladies can fall in love and then wander in their lives until they figure out what love means. Carol (Blanchett) discovers Therese (Mara)—or is it the other way?—and they can’t escape living their previous lives while they mature into their new life together.
The movie is based on the novel The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith.
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Movie review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2026 All rights reserved.
The “dime novels” in the Civil War
Think “blood-and-thunder”…
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Writing Rainbows: Poems for Grown-Ups with 59 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | May 17, 2026 | Poetry, Reviews of other poets, Tidbits
the drawbridge is creaking…
“…How can you ask a princess
To deal with this terrible mess?
Wake me again in another hundred years.”
from the children’s poem “…and after a hundred years had passed, Sleeping Beauty awoke (at last!) from her slumber” by Judith Viorst, in her book Sad Underwear, New York: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 1995
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Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2026 All rights reserved.
Book review: Shakespeare’s Wife
Germaine Greer went overboard a bit…
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Seeing far: Selected poems with 47 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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