Nota bene, writers! New and updated books for wordsmiths.
Steering the Craft, 2nd ed. A 21st-Century Guide to Sailing the Sea of Story by Ursula K. Le Guin. Mariner Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. First Mariner Books Edition 2015. 141 pp., $14.95 paperback. September 1, 2015.
The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person’s Guide to Writing in the 21st Century by Steven Pinker. Penguin Random House. 368 pp., $17.00 paperback. September 22, 2015.
Guest Review by Lanie Tankard
Writing has laws of perspective, of light and shade just as painting does, or music. If you are born knowing them, fine. If not, learn them. Then rearrange the rules to suit yourself.—Truman Capote, The Paris Review (interview)
[The classic usage guide.]
The most well-known rules have been found in Strunk & White’s classic, The Elements of Style. The fourth edition came out in 1999. Maira Kalman also illustrated a lovely version.
Ursula K. Le Guin and Steven Pinker compose words at far ends of the spectrum in their individual work, but both do it extremely well. In their guides discussed here, they each refer to Strunk & White. Le Guin says it’s the grammar manual she uses, calling it “honest, clear, funny, and useful,” but notes “an opposition movement” has arisen due to Strunk & White’s “implacable” views. Pinker claims a sense of “unease” and “discomfort” with such “immortal” rules that won’t bend, while acknowledging that much of Strunk & White is “as timeless as it is charming.”
The new second edition of Le Guin’s Steering the Craft embodies Strunk & White’s well-known maxim of omitting needless words. She completes this voyage in approximately 150 pages, trimming at least thirty from the first edition while shrinking the page size as well. It’s lighter, too, by seven ounces, and also available for Kindles.
What else is different from the 1998 book? The subtitle, for one thing. Before, it was: Exercises and Discussions on Story Writing for the Lone Navigator or the Mutinous Crew.
Now it’s: A 21st-Century Guide to Sailing the Sea of Story, foreshadowing the seventeen-year modernization found within.
In fact, it’s not the same book at all, as UKL completely revised and rewrote it “from stem to stern.” And fitting the motif, the publisher is now Mariner Books instead of Eighth Mountain Press.
[Ursula K. Le Guin.]
Ten chapters cover topics such as the sound of writing, punctuation, grammar, sentence length, complex syntax, repetition, point of view, and voice. Each chapter ends with an intriguingly titled exercise. “Am I Saramago” assigns an activity sans punctuation. She addresses in an appendix how to set up a peer group workshop. A glossary includes terms like armature, dingbat, and pathetic fallacy.
UKL is widely known for her beloved science fiction, but she’s also written poetry and essays—not to mention a dynamite acceptance speech for the National Book Foundation’s 2014 Distinguished Contribution to American Letters award. I’ve long admired UKL’s thoughts on creativity expressed in her collection titled The Wave in the Mind: Talks and Essays on the Writer, the Reader, and the Imagination.
Far more than a mere guidebook redux, the new Steering the Craft offers readers a visit with UKL herself and her lifetime of experience with words. The introduction alone is one of the purest examples of how excellent writing does not have to be wordy, for in its succinctness we hear her clear, calm voice in all its wisdom and wit.
Steering the Craft, 2nd ed., is a valuable sea chart for dedicated word crafters—call it Maker Faire for language. It’s brief. It’s brilliant. It’s UKL. I wish I could write like that.
![[Steven Pinker.]](https://i0.wp.com/richardgilbert.me/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Steven_Pinker_2011.jpg)
[Steven Pinker.]
Pinker writes from the perspective of experimental psychology, cognitive science, linguistics, and popular science. He is also chair of the Usage Panel of the American Heritage Dictionary. Here’s how the dictionary describes the assemblage: “The Usage Panel is a group of nearly 200 prominent scholars, creative writers, journalists, diplomats, and others in occupations requiring mastery of language. The Panelists are surveyed annually to gauge the acceptability of particular usage and grammatical constructions.” It’s fascinating to see the wide variety of wordsmiths included in this cluster.
In his prologue to The Sense of Style, Pinker stresses the idea that language “changes over time,” and pushes back against classic manuals such as Strunk & White’s in a forceful way. Yet he also advocates “reading more than one style guide.” Pinker concentrates on nonfiction, but notes “the explanations should be useful for fiction writers as well.”
This past summer, Pinker spoke about the future of writing in conversation with The Writer magazine. He pointed out, “There’s a lot of English that doesn’t follow rules.”
In an entertaining lecture last year sponsored by Skeptic Magazine, Pinker discussed his book, The Sense of Style, at length.
Channeling thoughts for others requires the use of language. Pausing to consider the craft can sharpen a writer’s pencil. Words have been my life as an editor. I tweak them for other people in various genres. Many books on the writing process line my shelves, along with a number of style manuals. Strunk & White has always been front and center. These two new volumes just earned space on my shelves as well.
Lanie Tankard is a freelance writer and editor in Austin, Texas. A member of the National Book Critics Circle and former production editor of Contemporary Psychology: A Journal of Reviews, she has also been an editorial writer for the Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville.
Thank you both, Lanie and Richard. I will diligently pass these along to other quarters where they might be appreciated as well. You are always at the forefront of things creative!
Excellent! Thanks for spreading the word and enlarging the conversation about writing. Gracias, too, for the compliment. The edge is where creativity happens, right? Write on!