Paging through a 20-year-old copy of William Zinsser's entertaining tome On Writing Well, I have happened upon a few pages on place. Samples of WZ's thought on writing about place are included below. Please forgive the gendered language. Apparently, even in 1990, gender neutral language was yet to be considered in On Writing Well.
Nevertheless, some Zinsserian nuggets...
"People and places are the twin pillars on which most nonfiction is built."
"Nobody turns so quickly into a bore as a traveler home from his travels."
"As a writer you must keep a tight rein on your subjective self -- the traveler touched by new sights and sounds and smells -- and keep an objective eye on the reader."
"One man's romantic sunrise is another man's hangover."
"...choose your words with unusual care. If a phrase comes to you easily, look at it with deep suspicion -- it's probably one of the innumerable cliches that have woven their way so tightly into the fabric of travel writing... Strive for fresh words and images."
"...whatever place you write about, go there often enough to isolate the qualities that make it special. Usually this will be some combination of place and the people who inhabit it."
"...when you write about a place, try to draw the best out of it. But if the process should work in reverse, let it draw the best out of you."
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