English
I went through and read many of the Blogs that were writen by my classmates, I found out that many of
them think the same things that I do about both of the books. Many people wrote in there Bolgs that
Strunk and White was not as good as the style book. The reason the Shurink and White is not as good as
Style is because style provides you with a format of how to get the work done, and does not just tell you
what you need to do.
Will said some pretty interesting things in his Blog. He said Williams book is better, for more indept
learning. I agree with that as well as many other things said by my classmates. All of the things that I read
were very similar to the things that we discussed in class. Also everone seems to have the same central
idea hat Shrunk and White is not as good as Style.
Both Style and Strunk and White are both very good books. However,
they are very different. The main difference is in the approach that each of
the uses. Style seems to explain more than stunk and white.
Many times in Stunk and White I found myself not knowing what was
going on because of the language they used. In class you gave an example
about telling someone to hit the ball squarely without telling how to hit the
ball. Style tells how to hit the ball and gives great examples and explains
much more. I understood the style book much more because they went into
detail. Although both books helped I feel that Style helped me much more.
Many people criticize books like Shrunk and White because they don’t
seem to help, but it helped me, they should just try to use some of the
concepts that Style uses. The main difference in the two books was only the
way in which they said things, and that made all the difference.
The style book will help my writing because it goes into great detail about how to
improve your writing. Unlike the Shrunk and White book, which tells you to hit the ball
squarely, Style tells you how to hit the ball.
The book says “We set for ourselves two more objectives, because seeming clarity in
professional writing is a matter that depends on more than merely a writer’s level of
skill”. That means that a good writer can write a bad paper if he does not follow the
direction correctly or if you use words that the readers don’t understand. It may hinder
your writing if you have developed bad writing habits. I think that is my main problem in
my writing I have developed many bad habits that I can not seem to break.
I also found the chapter on emphasis very informal if says if you put your important
ideas in the middle of a sentences it will swallow your sentence up. I found that to be
very helpful. Now I know not to but important things in the middle of a sentence. The
only thing that I did not understand was the things on cohesion, I think that the text just
went over my head.
Brandon Beverly
English 328
Feb 5 2004
Strunk and White Essay
I learned quite a bit from the Strunk and White reading. At first I thought that most of the material in
the book I knew, but I quickly found out that I was wrong. There were many things covered in the reading
that I did not know, that made me realize that my writing has much room for improvement.
The first thing that I did not know was very simple where to use apostasy s. The rule says form the
possessive singular of nouns by adding ‘s. I use to add it in the wrong place all of the time. Another
thing that I realized I needed to work on was using periods where commas should be. Often I would not
form complete sentences and place periods where commas should be placed.
One of the most important that I learned from Strunk and White was Omit needless words. All
through High School and most of college I thought that the most words or the most complex words make
your essay the best. The book made me realize that the simple approach is more effective than trying to
form complex sentences with a bunch of words that you do not use in everyday life. Another thing that I
feel will help my writing very much is writing concretely, not just writing trying to sound smart.
When I first started to read the book I thought that I knew everything but the more I started to read
the more I realized I knew a lot less then I thought I did. The more I read the more I learned, Strunk and
White should help my writing.
I learned a lot from reading the first section of Shunk and white. Many of
the things I can apply to my writing. I already was familiar with many of the
rules in the first section but many of them I was not familiar with.
Therefore, I learned a lot from the readings.
One of the rules that I did not understand at first was rule 1. Rule 1 says
form the possesive sigular of nouns by adding ing's. I found out that I was
using this rule the wrong way. Another thing that I was not doing correctly in
my writing was Encloseing parenthetic expressions between commas. I did
do this sometimes, but I did not understand the rule nor did I now the
reason behind the rule.
The reading was very helpful to me because it broke the rules down in a
way that made me understand them. Also they told the reasons for the rules
which made them make more since to me.
In writing I think you should express whatever, feeling you are feeling at the time. If that means breaking the patterns you are use to when writing it does not matter. Your writing should be creative and not boring.
Rules are made to be broken, even if they are the rules of writing. As long as you do what you are asked when writing it does not matter how you do it. Everyones writing will be very different because everyones mind is different. Wheather or not you can break rules is determined on who you are writing for and what you are writing.
In todays society there are many Markers of social sdanding. The best one I can think of is one that one of my classmamates said and it was the way people veiw you if you do not speak SAE (Standared American English.) If you do not talk a certain way people may view you as less smart.
If you have to write without revising or editing, your work it may help your ideas flow easier. If you
are unable to edit you will have all of your ideas in front of you, making it easier for you to be creative.
What you thought was a bad idea, you may find it to be a good one later on in your process. Also seeing
your errors will help you not to make them again.
When you write things on the computer you are constantly revising, that takes away from your
creativity because you are focused on perfection. Also a computer will often do all of the work for you,
and that is never good. While working on a computer you can easily get distracted because there are so
many things to do, but when it is just you your pen and paper you are able to stay focused on the task
at hand.
It was very different when I was typing on the computer from when I was writing in the classroom. I
tried to write it just as it appears in my notebook but it was hard not to revise I found my self
concentrating more on editing than writing. I will also admit that I used spell cheak.
