Gary

“All this said, there’s nothing wrong with sentences constructed in the passive voice – you’re simply choosing where you want to put the sentence’s emphasis – and I see nothing objectionable in, say, The floors were swept, the beds made, the rooms aired out. Since the point of interest is the cleanness of the house and not the identity of the cleaner. But many a sentence can be improved by putting its true protagonist at the beginning, so that’s something to be considered.fn10”
― Benjamin Dreyer, Dreyer’s English: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style: The UK Edition

“He implied without saying."
...I scarcely had the heart to cross out "without quite saying" and to note in the margin, politely and succinctly, "”
― Benjamin Dreyer, Dreyer's English: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style

“People who are in the business of hating the relatively new-fashioned use of “begs the question” hate it vehemently, and they hate it loudly. Unfortunately, subbing in “raises the question” or “inspires the query” or any number of other phrasings fools no one; one can always detect the deleted “begs the question,” a kind of prose pentimento, for those of you who were paying attention in art history class or have read Lillian Hellman’s thrilling if dubiously accurate memoir.”
― Benjamin Dreyer, Dreyer’s English: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style

“A reversal is a total 180.*10 If you do a total 360, you’re facing the same direction as when you began.”
― Benjamin Dreyer, Dreyer’s English: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style