The Qualities of Good Prose

by Thonney, Teresa

• ISBN13: 9780321091161
• ISBN10: 0321091167
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2003-01-01
• Publisher: Longman

Summary

Qualities of Good Prose provides students with practical, applicable advice for becoming better writers and the keys to writing with clarity, precision, and style. Other books on the market give instructors all they could ever want, along with much they will never useat a high price for students. Compact, direct and packed with practical advice, The Qualities of Good Prose does what a college composition textbook should do: teach students how to write better.

Table of Contents

I. CLARITY.

1. Getting Started.
Getting Motivated.
Choosing a Subject.
Narrowing and Focusing Your Subject.
Considering Your Audience and Purpose.
Organizing Prose.
Mixing Patterns of Organization.
Writing the First Draft.

2. Essays.
Writing Essays.
Supporting Main Ideas in Essays.
Revising Essays.

3. Paragraphs.
Body Paragraphs.
Introductions.
Conclusions.
Transition Paragraphs.

4. Sentences.
Sentence Parts.
Sentence Structure.
Sentence Rhythms and Lengths.

II. PRECISION.

5. Words.
Choosing Words.
Linking Words.
Misplacing Words.

6. Punctuation.
Using Commas.
Using Dashes.
Using Colons.
Using Semicolons.
Using Quotation Marks.
Varying Sentence Punctuation.

III. ELEGANCE.

7. Connections.
Coordination.
Subordination.
Arranging Sentence Parts.

8. Enhancing Prose.
Comparisons.
Allusions.
Alliteration.
Rhetorical Parallelism.
Wordplay.

9. Polishing Prose.
Revising for Conciseness.
Revising for Sentence Variety.
Revising for Sound.
Proofreading and Editing.

Answers to Exercises.

Appendix A. Additional Exercises.

Appendix B. Recognizing the Parts of a Sentence.

Appendix C. Transitions.

Appendix D. Words Commonly Confused.

Glossary of Terms.

Index.