Well-Crafted Sentence: A Writer's Guide to Style
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Grounded in the art of writing, The Well-Crafted Sentence zeroes in on the sentence, offering a range of revision strategies that lead students to write fuller, more well-developed prose. In a friendly, conversational style, Nora Bacon makes clear how and why sentences work to focus, balance, develop, and qualify writers’ ideas.Because students are more likely to try out new sentence structures if they’ve seen them in writing they admire, examples throughout the text are drawn from readings by accomplished stylists whose full pieces are also included in a chapter at the end of the book. Integrated exercises and editing practice help students apply concepts to their own writing.Affordable and brief, The Well-Crafted Sentence works as a core classroom text or as a supplement.
Preface for Instructors Introduction for Students 1. The Sentence’s Working Parts Clause Structure Transformations within the Clause Adding to the Clause Modifiers Linking Independent Clauses Dependent Clauses Adverb Clauses Adjective Clauses Noun Clauses2. Well-Focused Sentences: The Subject-Verb Pair Populated Prose Active Voice and Passive Voice Variation in Sentence Focus Sharpening the Focus Double-check Sentences with Abstract Subjects Double-check Sentences with "There" in the Subject Position Keep Subject Phrases Short Uncover Subjects Buried in Introductory Phrases Transform Nouns to Verbs3. Well-Balanced Sentences: Coordination and Parallel Structure Coordination Parallel Structure Correlative Conjunctions Variation in Coordinate Series Length Repetition4. Well-Developed Sentences: Modification Early Modifiers and the Pleasures of the Periodic Sentence End Modifiers and the Pleasures of the Cumulative Sentence5. Modifiers Following the Noun: Adjective Clauses and Adjective Phrases The Structure of Adjective Clauses Choices in Crafting Adjective Clauses Who or Whom? Should an Adjective Clause Be Set Off with Punctuation? Which or That – or Not? Reducing Adjective Clauses Adjective Phrases6. Modifiers Built from Verbs: Verbal Phrases Functions of Verbal Phrases Managing Emphasis with Verbal Phrases Reducing Clauses to Create Verbal Phrases Dangling Modifiers7. Noun Phrases Working as Modifiers: Appositives and Absolutes Noun Phrases in Apposition Identifying People Defining Terms Filling in Examples or Explanations Renaming with a Twist Other Structures in Apposition Absolute Phrases8. Special Effects: Expectations and Exceptions Focus on the Subject Completeness and Explicitness Sentence VarietyModel TextsLouise Erdrich, ShamengwaHenry Louis Gates, Sin BoldlyHenry Louis Gates, The Two Nations of Black AmericaTim O’Brien, On the Rainy RiverArundhati Roy, The Algebra of Infinite Justice Oliver Sacks, selection from The Case of the Colorblind PainterOliver Sacks, HousecallsDavid Sedaris, Genetic EngineeringJane Smiley, Say it Ain’t So, Huck Andrew Sullivan, State of the UnionAmy Tan, Mother TongueAmy Tan, My Grandmother’s ChoiceGlossary of Terms Sample Responses to Exercises Index
