Über den Autor
Ben Yagoda is a journalism professor in the English Department at the University of Delaware. He is the author of Memoir: A History; Will Rogers: A Biography; When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It; The Sound on the Page; The Art of Fact; and About Town: The New Yorker and the World it Made; and a mehr anzeigen coauthor of All in a Lifetime: An Autobiography about Dr. Ruth Westheimer. He has written for Slate, The Chronicle of Higher Education, The New York Times Book Review, Stop Smiling, and other publications. He lives in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, with his wife and two daughters. weniger anzeigen
Werke von Ben Yagoda
When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It: The Parts of Speech, for Better And/Or Worse (2007) 299 Exemplare
How to Not Write Bad: The Most Common Writing Problems and the Best Ways to Avoid Them (2013) 117 Exemplare
The B Side: The Death of Tin Pan Alley and the Rebirth of the Great American Song (2015) 78 Exemplare
You Need to Read This: The Death of the Imperative Mode, the Rise of the American Glottal Stop, the Bizarre Popularity… (2014) 4 Exemplare
The B-Side 2 Exemplare
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Booknotes: America's Finest Authors on Reading, Writing, and the Power of Ideas (1997) — Mitwirkender — 429 Exemplare
Backstabbers, Crazed Geniuses, and Animals We Hate: The Writers of Slate's "Assessment" Column Tell It Like It Is (2006) — Mitwirkender — 20 Exemplare
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Wissenswertes
- Gebräuchlichste Namensform
- Yagoda, Ben
- Geburtstag
- 1954-02-22
- Geschlecht
- male
- Nationalität
- USA
- Geburtsort
- New York, New York, USA
- Wohnorte
- New York, New York, USA (birthplace)
New Rochelle, New York, USA
New Haven, Connecticut, USA
Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, USA - Berufe
- journalist
professor (English)
English professor - Organisationen
- University of Delaware
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Rezensionen
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- ISBNs
- 26
He divides his investigation into two parts: history and practice. The historical facet is interesting because it captures how style changes over time. Without a grasp of the past, it’s hard to figure out why we got here and how to move forward. At times, this section can involve a lot of names that I’m frankly unfamiliar with, but Yagoda offers erudite insights about topics like how speech and writing mingle or how modern writing should marry the heart and the head.
The section on practice is filled with transcripts of interviews from great authors. Yagoda himself is not the main driving force here as much as the questioner. The variety of writers this second-half deep and wide. Its meatiest chapter is about forms and genres; in 58 pages, that chapter looks at an interview with one-or-more expert in each writing form – personal essays, stories, poetry, online, etc. – and discusses how that person gained a remarkable style.
This book seems most suited towards writers in an educational degree program, but newer writers on their own can benefit from the self-discipline of reading Yagoda’s words. He concludes by noting that the cultivation of a writing style occurs throughout an entire life. It accompanies the building of inner strength and is most enhanced through reading, not practice. Thus, even experienced writers (and middle-aged fogeys like myself!) can benefit from his studied expertise. My authorship will benefit from the rich tapestry of quotations noted here.… (mehr)