An Editor's Tips for Writers

Redundancy is just one of the many problems that fall under the general category of Wordiness. (I'll be adding more to the Wordiness category soon.) A redundant phrase or expression is called a pleonasm. You may think you know when a redundancy occurs, but some of them can be subtle.

How often have you heard a friend say something like this: "An unexpected surprise came when a pair of baby twins was born at 12 midnight"? What is a surprise if not unexpected? What are twins if not a pair? Who can be born but a baby? When is midnight if not at 12? Your friend could just as well have said, "A surprise came when twins were born at midnight" with far less repetition.

Or what if you heard someone say, "The armed gunman gave an advance warning that he would make death threats on their lives"? Can you find the pleonasms in that sentence? The expressions we use are full of unwitting redundancy.

I've prepared a good long list of pleonasms; some of them are rather funny. Can you see what's wrong with these? Can you think of any others? Once you start paying attention to each of your words, I'm sure you'll begin to detect occasional redundancies. In fact, e-mail me with your pet peeve redundancies and pleonasms, and I'll add them to this list!

- Dry desert
- Free gift
- End result
- Over and over again
- Whether or not
- Former business failed/former ex-husband
- Personal friends/personal opinion/my personal anything
- Standard orthodoxy
- Genuine original
- Ancient fossil
- Basic necessities/basic fundamentals
- Major milestone
- Linger behind
- Rugged mountain range
- Quickly mushroomed
- Interconnect/intermix/interlink
- Future ahead looks bright
- Main thrust
- Small cubbyhole
- Familiar fixture
- Single most/single biggest
- Point in time/period of time
- Death threats on his life
- Close proximity
- Actual experience/past experience
- Advance planning/advance warning/advance reservations
- All meet together/join together
- Armed gunman
- 12 midnight/12 noon
- Autobiography of one's life
- Awkward predicament
- Cease and desist
- Each and every
- First and foremost
- Cheap price/expensive price
- Commute back and forth
- Consensus of opinion
- Difficult dilemma
- Estimated roughly/guesstimated
- Filled to capacity
- Frozen ice
- General public
- Green in color
- Natural instinct
- Null and void
- Pre-recorded
- The reason is because
- Regular routine
- Suddenly exploded
- Surrounded on all sides
- Broke both his legs
- The winter months
- Postponed until later
- Mutual cooperation
- In order to...