|
||||
|
About our Courses | Short Words | About Us | Browse Booklists | Ask Questions | Gripes and Groans
|
||||
|
This article
appeared in the Spring 1999 edition of Short
Words, the newsletter of Tim Albert Training.
It was written by Neville Goodman. |
Which reference book? 'Asking Blackwell's on-line bookshop
for 'writing and editing guides' gave a list of 2,014
titles. Lists of this size are unmanageable.' Browsing the Internet gives a good idea of just how many books there are on writing in English. Asking Blackwell's on-line bookshop for 'style guides' gave a list of 732 titles, 'thesauri' gave 209, and 'writing and editing guides' gave 2,014. Lists of this size are unmanageable. Things appeared a little better at Amazon's website, which allowed me to make a further selection from a basic list of 300 titles retrieved by the key words 'usage guides' and 'English'. So, while it may not be entirely fair to the authors and compilers of the books I do not know, my recommendations are all books I have collected and used over the years. The complete plain words by Gowers is my first choice. Aimed originally at civil servants, it is cheap, full of common sense and well revised. It contains theory - why style is important - as well as advice. The advice is well ordered, in self-explanatory chapters. Even its one checklist chapter is worth reading despite the alphabetical layout. My recommended dictionary is the Concise Oxford dictionary of current English , for no reason other than I like the layout and have always used it. But a dictionary is of little help in deciding which of 'little' or 'small', 'permit' or 'allow', 'finish' or 'end' is the 'correct' (or 'right'?) alternative. (In this context 'correct' would seem to be correct; see below.) That is why writers need a thesaurus, but a thesaurus without meanings (such as Roget's) is useless. The Penguin Guide to synonyms and related words, whose compilers are the unlikely sounding Hayakawa and Ehrlich, says that: 'Right is largely interchangeable with correct, but often adds a hint of moral approval'. The novelist David Lodge summarised the difficulties faced by style guides when he reviewed the Longman guide in 1988: there is bound to be overlap with the function of a dictionary, and only those who don't need a style guide will know how to use it. For example, how do you know that the entry 'dangling participle' will have the answer to your question? That is why another of my votes goes to the Reader's Digest publication: The right word at the right time. If you look up 'dangling participle' in that book you will be referred to 'misrelated constructions'. That section includes five pages of discussed examples, marked with crosses or question marks depending on the degree of acceptability. The entry ends with useful cross-references. Returning to dangling participles, the Reader's Digest book is large. For a book that will fit in a briefcase, Bill Bryson's Troublesome Words can't be beaten. If you look under 'dangling modifiers' you will discover the fault at the beginning of the last paragraph, as well as a good deal of humour. Style guides tend to lack humour; Bryson's has it in abundance, as in his explanation of the difference between economic and economical. An economic rent is one that is not too cheap for the landlord. An economical rent is one that is not too expensive for the tenant.
Writing guides: a basic selection
|
|||
|
|
|
|
||
|
|
||||
