Strong Writing - Find a more Effective Word

One way you can make your writing stronger is to choose a powerful, interesting word, rather than a weak or overused one. Yesterday we looked at how we can improve our writing by choosing our verbs carefully. Today we're going to see how we can use a thesaurus to find just the right adjective.

A thesaurus is a book, rather like a dictionary, which helps you find words which have similar meanings. I'm currently using the big Collins Thesaurus A-Z which has a RRP of £25, but was on sale in WH Smith recently for £6.25. Let's use it to find alternative words for strong.

Under strong, we find fifteen basic meanings listed: powerful, fit, self-confident, durable, forceful, extreme, decisive, persuasive, pungent, highly-flavoured, keen, intense, staunch, distinct, and bright. The Collins Thesaurus lists several alternative words for each of these definitions of strong, and also includes opposites for several of them.

In this posting, I'm using strong to describe writing, so the best synonym, or equivalent word, from that list of basic meanings is forceful. Its given alternatives are powerful, intense, vigorous. So instead of saying,

You can use a thesaurus to make your writing stronger.

I could write,

You can use a thesaurus to make your writing more vigorous.

But if I was describing after-shave instead of writing, I might want to use a word that is listed under the pungent option, as these are more appropriate for smells and liquids: powerful, concentrated, pure, undiluted.

If, on the other hand, I wanted to describe a person who had a strong character, I might look at the self-confident option, where I would find determined, tough, brave, aggressive, courageous, high-powered, forceful, resilient, feisty, resolute, resourceful, tenacious, plucky, hard-nosed, steadfast, unyielding, hard as nails, self-assertive, stouthearted, firm in spirit.

So you can see that by looking up just one simple word, you can find numerous others which may give you the exact nuance you are looking for. Using more telling words (another one I found in the Thesaurus) will also make your writing more engaging and memorable.