I love E.B. White. His essays, his fiction, and his update to Strunk’s Style Guide.

He has a way with words that puts me to shame. Take this short paragraph on writing from the Elements of Style:

Writing is, for most, laborious and slow. The mind travels faster than the pen; consequently, writing becomes a question of learning to make occasional wing shots, bringing down the bird of thought as it flashes by. A writer is a gunner, sometimes waiting in the blind for something to come in, sometimes roaming the countryside hoping to scare something up. Like other gunners, the writer must cultivate patience, working many covers to bring down one partridge.

It’s an unforced metaphor. Clear, articulate, and illuminating. It’s just good writing. Every so often I enjoy picking up a something short by him, just to savor a few of his thoughts on paper.