The Sense of Style : The Thinking Person's Guide to Writing in the 21st Century - Steven Pinker

The Sense of Style

The Thinking Person's Guide to Writing in the 21st Century

By: Steven Pinker

Paperback | 21 October 2015 | Edition Number 1

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Steven Pinker, the bestselling author of The Language Instinct, deploys his gift for explaining big ideas in The Sense of Style - an entertaining writing guide for the 21st century

What is the secret of good prose? Does writing well even matter in an age of instant communication? Should we care? In this funny, thoughtful book about the modern art of writing, Steven Pinker shows us why we all need a sense of style.

More than ever before, the currency of our social and cultural lives is the written word, from Twitter and texting to blogs, e-readers and old-fashioned books. But most style guides fail to prepare people for the challenges of writing in the 21st century, portraying it as a minefield of grievous errors rather than a form of pleasurable mastery. They fail to deal with an inescapable fact about language: it changes over time, adapted by millions of writers and speakers to their needs. Confusing changes in the world with moral decline, every generation believes the kids today are degrading society and taking language with it. A guide for the new millennium, writes Steven Pinker, has to be different.

Drawing on the latest research in linguistics and cognitive science, Steven Pinker replaces the recycled dogma of previous style guides with reason and evidence. This thinking person''s guide to good writing shows why style still matters: in communicating effectively, in enhancing the spread of ideas, in earning a reader''s trust and, not least, in adding beauty to the world. Eye-opening, mind-expanding and cheerful, The Sense of Style shows that good style is part of what it means to be human.

Industry Reviews
'Witty, direct and idiosyncratic . . . often laugh-out-loud funny . . . refreshingly uncensorious . . . It helps enormously that he is such a beautiful stylist himself.' Paula Byrne, The Times

'Wonderful . . . No true lover of this chaotic, unregulated, magnificently vital language could fail to thrill.' Christopher Hart, Sunday Times

'Brainy, funny . . . a comedy of linguistic bad manners.' Peter Conrad, Guardian

'Outstanding . . . the one book I can unreservedly recommend as a guide on how to write well . . . unique as well as brilliant.' Oliver Kamm, The Times

Other Books By Steven Pinker

The Blank Slate : The Modern Denial of Human Nature - Steven Pinker
The Language Instinct : The New Science of Language and Mind - Steven Pinker
How the Mind Works - Steven Pinker

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