Clear and Simple Writing

I have deliberately cultivated a simple and even colloquial style...In the past, virtually all writing was ornate. Read a Victorian novel, for instance. Read even Dickens, the best of all the Victorians. It is only comparatively recently that writing has, in the hands of some writers, become simple and clear...But how does one go about writing clearly? I don't know. I presume you have to start with an orderly mind and a knack for marshaling thoughts so that you know exactly what you want to say. Beyond that, I am helpless.

Isaac Asimov (1920-1992), I. Asimov: A Memoir, 1994