It has long been established that verbose translations are the rule, whatever source or target language is involved. It is not easy to compare the length of a translation with the original text, for different criteria (number of words, number of phonemes, number of lines) give contradictory results. It is neither useful nor relevant to appraise the quality of a translation by its length alone since lengthiness implies much more than mere redundancy. Examples show that correcting verbose translations rarely boils down to cutting words out but rather entails a new formulation for reasons of clarity and fluency. Some tips will help students eradicate translational verbosity at the root when translating or revising a text.