Writing To Persuade by Trish Hall

WRITING TO PERSUADE by Trish Hall, former editor of the New York Times Op-Ed page, explores “How to Bring People Over to Your Side.” In doing so, she shares anecdotes from her career and specific recommendations, especially about building empathy. Noting her desire to pass on what she has learned about writing and editing, Hall says, “be assured that using these methods, which require artistry, technique, and an understanding of human psychology, will increase your odds of success [in persuading someone to see your point of view].” Hall dedicated this work to her teachers and I believe that our teachers and students will benefit from reading this book and the other writing texts she mentions: Strunk and White’s Elements of Style, Zinsser’s On Writing Well, McPhee’s Draft No. 4, and Lamott’s Bird by Bird.  

WRITING TO PERSUADE is meant to be consulted frequently: it includes bolded sub-points and a helpful index. Plus, Hall uses the graphic of a conversation bubble to highlight key points (like lists of publications that liberals or conservatives should read/watch to better understand the other viewpoint). Even a short excerpt like the Preface, which lists and briefly explains Fifteen Principles of Persuasive Writing, will be valuable. One point I wish more students appreciated? “To write well, read omnivorously.” WRITING TO PERSUADE received a starred review from Library Journal.

Dreyer's English by Benjamin Dreyer

 
DREYER'S ENGLISH by Benjamin Dreyer is aptly subtitled “An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style from the Copy Chief of Random House.” However, that fails to truly convey the conversational tone which Dreyer adopts as he muses about his long experience and offers numerous suggestions. One is the challenge to go a week without writing these 12 words or phrases: very, rather, really, quite, in fact, just, so, pretty, of course, surely, that said, and actually.  In fact, (oops!), Dreyer notes: “feel free to go the rest of your life without another ‘actually’.”    

Some of his best advice? “One of the best ways to determine if your prose is well-constructed is to read it aloud.” I wish our students would listen! They will find much to inform and improve their writing in chapters titled “60 Assorted Things to Do (and Not to Do) with Punctuation” or “A Little Grammar is a Dangerous Thing” or “The Trimmables” on editing superfluous phrases. Publishers Weekly gave DREYER'S ENGLISH a starred review and Booklist described it as a “remarkably fun book about a dastardly dry subject…”  Enjoy!

The Prodigal Tongue by Lynne Murphy

THE PRODIGAL TONGUE by Lynne Murphy is subtitled: “The Love-Hate Relationship between American and British English.” And Murphy, born and raised in New York State, but now a Professor of Linguistics at the University of Sussex, is awesome/brilliant at describing differences and analyzing the impact of time, environment, and social class on language.   She is very good at finding amusingly relevant quotes, too: “There is no such thing as American English.  There is English. And there are mistakes.”

Murphy provides a series of extensive notes and references as well as some fun quizzes about word origins.  Debrief, for example, came from the Royal Air Force in WWII while ear muffs are a mid-19^th century American invention.  Have fun with THE PRODIGAL TONGUE – writers for The Guardian and The Wall Street Journal  and The Boston Globe certainly did  - and you will be surprised at all you learn! Starred review from Library Journal.