For more than a decade, "Clear and Simple as the Truth" has
guided readers to consider style not as an elegant accessory of
effective prose but as its very heart. Francis-Noel Thomas and Mark
Turner present writing as an intellectual activity, not a passive
application of verbal skills. In classic style, the motive is
truth, the purpose is presentation, the reader and writer are
intellectual equals, and the occasion is informal. This general
style of presentation is at home everywhere, from business memos to
personal letters and from magazine articles to student essays.
Everyone talks about style, but no one explains it. The authors of
this book do; and in doing so, they provoke the reader to consider
style, not as an elegant accessory of effective prose, but as its
very heart.
At a time when writing skills have virtually disappeared, what
can be done? If only people learned the principles of verbal
correctness, the essential rules, wouldn't good prose simply fall
into place? Thomas and Turner say no. Attending to rules of
grammar, sense, and sentence structure will no more lead to
effective prose than knowing the mechanics of a golf swing will
lead to a hole-in-one. Furthermore, ten-step programs to better
writing exacerbate the problem by failing to recognize, as Thomas
and Turner point out, that there are many styles with different
standards.
The book is divided into four parts. The first, "Principles of
Classic Style," defines the style and contrasts it with a number of
others. "The Museum" is a guided tour through examples of writing,
both exquisite and execrable. "The Studio," new to this edition,
presents a series of structured exercises. Finally, "Further
Readings in Classic Prose" offers a list of additional examples
drawn from a range of times, places, and subjects. A companion
website, classicprose.com, offers supplementary examples, exhibits,
and commentary, and features a selection of pieces written by
students in courses that used "Clear and Simple as the Truth" as a
textbook."
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