|
Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them (P.S.) | 
| Author: Francine Prose
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
Buy New: $10.88
You Save: $3.07 (22%)
Rating:  79 reviews
Sales Rank: 7970
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.6
ISBN: 0060777052
Dewey Decimal Number: 808.02
EAN: 9780060777050
Publication Date: April 1, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Long before there were creative-writing workshops and degrees, how did aspiring writers learn to write? By reading the work of their predecessors and contemporaries, says Francine Prose. In Reading Like a Writer, Prose invites you to sit by her side and take a guided tour of the tools and the tricks of the masters. She reads the work of the very best writers—Dostoyevsky, Flaubert, Kafka, Austen, Dickens, Woolf, Chekhov—and discovers why their work has endured. She takes pleasure in the long and magnificent sentences of Philip Roth and the breathtaking paragraphs of Isaac Babel; she is deeply moved by the brilliant characterization in George Eliot's Middlemarch. She looks to John Le Carré for a lesson in how to advance plot through dialogue, to Flannery O'Connor for the cunning use of the telling detail, and to James Joyce and Katherine Mansfield for clever examples of how to employ gesture to create character. She cautions readers to slow down and pay attention to words, the raw material out of which literature is crafted. Written with passion, humor, and wisdom, Reading Like a Writer will inspire readers to return to literature with a fresh eye and an eager heart.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 74 more reviews...
 Be a Better Reader in Order to Become a Better Writer September 1, 2006
149 out of 170 found this review helpful
You certainly are a person who enjoys reading. The beauty of this book is that its author teaches us how to read carefully, deliberately and slowly in order to digest and extract the ideas behind the words, and also to identify the style of an specific writer. By doing so Francine Prose gives us the tool that we may require to become a better writer. Basically is a process of learning by example, and Prose goes all the way to select and bring us a lot of examples, both from classical and contemporary authors.
As you advance through the chapters you will find examples covering the fundamentals of writing, including aspects related to narrative, plot development, characters creation, as well as the basics of sentence and paragraph structure.
Even if you have no intention at all of becoming a writer you will love this book, since it also teaches us how to have a better appreciation of what we read.
Prose on Prose August 29, 2006
113 out of 135 found this review helpful
Francine Prose knows prose. In "Reading Like a Writer," she presents the timeless truth that great writers are great readers of great writers. More than that, Prose parses how to read well, which in our hurried, image-driven age, has become something of a lost art, even for literature lovers.
She not only encourages and explains the reading of the classics, Prose also offers a diet rich in vignettes from an egalitarian menu of authors. She is like a chef who tells you to eat great food, teaches you how to cook five-star meals, and then takes you to a five-star restaurant to become a connoisseur.
As the subtitle suggests, two primary audiences will enjoy "Reading Like a Writer." Anyone who loves books, will glean insights into great books and how to enjoy them. Anyone who wants to write books, will learn how to write better--more creatively, powerfully, and yet still personally.
Reviewer: Bob Kellemen, Ph.D., is the author of "Soul Physicians," "Spiritual Friends," and "Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction."
"Putting every word on trial for its life." October 3, 2006
64 out of 66 found this review helpful
Francine Prose, in "Reading Like a Writer," argues that creative writing cannot be taught in a classroom. A workshop may provide valuable encouragement and support for a fledgling writer, and a good instructor may show a novice how to edit his work more effectively. However, a writer learns his craft by reading and rereading the books, novels, plays, and short stories of great writers, and he improves his skills through practice. Prose recommends studying "meter with Ovid, plot construction with Homer, comedy with Aristophanes." She backs up her thesis by giving a host of examples from writers she admires, such as Austen, Hemingway, Joyce, Chekhov, and others who are a bit more obscure.
Prose discusses the basics, including the use of the exact word, sentence building, paragraphing, point of view, character, and dialogue. Close reading, she asserts, enables us to understand not only what the writer is stating, but also what he is implying. The subtext is often as important, if not more important, than the text itself. Throughout "Reading Like a Writer" are excerpts, some brief, some lengthy, from a variety of sources, followed by Prose's witty, insightful, and informative commentary. Why does the writer choose one particular word or phrase rather than another? How do the seemingly minor details and gestures in a scene sometimes convey more information than the characters' statements?
"Reading Like a Writer" is not a handbook or a manual. It is a love letter to the mysterious alchemy, the magic that occurs when a reader encounters a book, poem, or story that not only entertains him, but also moves and transforms him. Francine Prose's favorite writers may not be our favorites, but all readers who love literature will appreciate her enthusiasm and respect for the written word. Her suggestions about how to read more effectively are useful not just for budding writers but for anyone who would like to come away from a book with a deeper appreciation of the author's craft. As Prose says, "Reading this way requires a certain amount of stamina, concentration, and patience."" The reward for all of this effort lies in "the excitement of approaching, as nearly as you can hope to come, the hand and mind of the artist."
 Already motivated to learn, so don't waste my time on more motivation December 28, 2006
38 out of 50 found this review helpful
Because my opinion is so divergent from the other reviews here (all but two gave five-stars), I read them to see what I might have missed. Instead I found myself wondering whether we had read the same book: See "Review the Reviews" below. Reviewer Bukowsky (October 2, 2006) states "... not a handbook or a manual. It is a love letter ..." thereby unintentionally capturing the basic failing of this book - its title states that it is "A Guide ..."
What I expected was a series of examples with analysis of what made them work or not work. There were far fewer examples than I expected, the analysis was typically slight, and there was too much extraneous material.
For example, in the chapter on "Sentences", too much of the commentary on the examples was simply effusive praise of the sentence's author. I strongly disagreed with Prose's assessment of roughly a third of the sentences cited, but she didn't provide enough analysis for me to understand her point of view (declarations of something as great is not an argument).
In the chapter on "Paragraphs", the author starts with an example from Babel's "Crossing into Poland." At first I thought it strange to be using a translated work as an example, but then she presented another translation as a counterpoint. I then thought "What a brilliant way to get examples of the effects of the differences in choices by two professional writers." However, she failed to effectively follow through. Also, I differed with her on the analysis of the passage in question: "... the highroad ... built ... upon the bones of peasants." Her analysis was that it "introduced some element of unease." My analysis was that it identified the protagonist as a Communist (In discussing the related "My First Goose", Prose identifies the protagonist as a follower of Lenin).
In the next portion of "Paragraphs", Prose rambles about the Rex Stout mystery "Plot It Yourself" that hinges on how the paragraph choices were made in three documents. She give less specific insight than you would find in a brief introduction to composition, and essentially punts the issue, saying it is something that has significant impact, but that each writer must develop their own ear for it.
The first part of the chapter on "Character" focuses on von Kleist's novella "The Marquise of O-." It present a few passages which are useful illustrations. However, she spends inordinate time on the plot, far beyond what is needed - or useful - to appreciate those passages. I found the disorganized repeated rehashing of the plot elements to be annoying. This might not have been so bad if she hadn't started the chapter with a digression on one college class where she had assigned the novella.
Each of the chapters had similar problems. This was a book that I couldn't help putting down, but because of the many positive reviews, I kept picking it back up. I didn't get to the end of most of the chapters: When I found I couldn't tolerate anymore of a chapter, I skipped to the beginning of the next one to see if it was any better.
Review of Reviews: When you read the other reviews, ask yourself "Is the reviewer praising the concept of the book, or its implementation?" Is the reviewer talking about being "inspired" - or "motivated" - to learn from reading more closely, or has s/he actually learned an appropriate amount from this book (of 268 pages). That is, is the reviewer responding to the author's gushing about great writing and her teaching of literature, or to the book providing useful insight on how to be a better reader and/or writer?
BACKGROUND / CONTEXT of my review: By profession, I am a senior engineer/scientist and have done extensive technical writing, but I have also done extensive advocacy writing - marketing (advocacy of products and services) and political (advocacy of ideas).
I am a staunch believer in "close reading" as a way to learn better writing, and encourage it by involving all members of my teams in the rewriting/editing process. Less experienced writers are not just given advice on improving their documents, but are expected to provide suggestions on improving documents written by better writers.
Okay As An Undergraduate Textbook March 23, 2007
35 out of 52 found this review helpful
The premise of this book is inviting and refreshing. Like the New Critics, Francine Prose believes in close textural analysis; she is horrified by the twin curses of best sellerdom (speed reading and speed writing); thinks creative writing courses are a crock (good for you old girl! about time somebody exposed that racket), and she holds with the Greeks that while good writing cannot be taught, it can be learned by emulation of the greats. At long last, I thought, a corrective to all the bad fiction being written today and an antidote to the book club drivel being fobbed off on unsuspecting readers as great literature. Could this be the book that finally delivers us from the scourge of `hysterical realism' (Rushdie, Pynchon, DeLillo, Franzen, Foster Wallace, Zadie Smith)? Another Plus: Francine Prose hasn't much respect for the way literature is being taught in graduate programs of American universities. So what's not to like?
This book, I'm afraid.
It has received glowing reviews. But there is so much hype in the publishing industry I rarely purchase a book based on reviews, especially at today's prices. I reserve the book with my library system, and buy it only if it passes the smell test. I waited weeks for "Reading Like a Writer," and as much as I'd like to report that it was worth the wait, I cannot. After a slogging through three chapters, my heart sank. Despite her love of good writing, Francine Prose's approach to the subject is plodding, humdrum and idiosyncratic. She begins with individual words, then methodically proceeds to sentences and paragraphs in the fashion of a writer of college textbooks. Francine Prose is that curious phenomenon, an accomplished writer of fiction who cannot write interesting nonfiction prose for sour apples. As you would expect of any disciple of the New Critics, her analyses of great writers are always spot on; but that is not the challenge of a book like this, which is to write ABOUT inspired prose IN inspired prose. A curious irony: here is an author who loves eloquent writing, but who writes about it in only serviceable textbook prose. (Frank Leavis she is not.)
There's a good deal of redundancy in this book. What aspiring writer needs to be told how exquisite the final paragraph of Joyce's "The Dead" is? In contrast, her bibliography of great writers is remarkable chiefly for its eccentricity. I can't pretend to have read all of the titles on her list, and I refuse to dismiss books on the ground that I've never heard of them; but a few of them I do know, and know well. For example, F. Scott Fitzgerald's "Tender Is the Night" is NOT a successful novel, not even close. Don't take my word for it: Ernest Hemingway complained that the book was a thinly-disguised biography of Fitzgerald's rich friends (the Murphys). At the risk of sounding caustically proscriptive, I found Thomas Pynchon's "Gravity's Rainbow" unreadable*. And is "The Perfect Spy" really John Le Carre's best novel? Hardly. It may be a 'literary' success in the conventional sense (it preserves all the Aristotelian unities), but it has none of the cold war drama, lyricism and descriptive poetry of the George Smiley novels. I'm afraid the definitive book on the art of fiction has yet to be written. (And to be fair to Francine Prose, maybe it never will be.)
* For more on the self-conscious zaniness of `hysterical realism' see "The Smallness of the 'Big' Novel: Human, All Too Inhuman" By James Wood, The New Republic, 7/24/2000; and Tell Me How Does It Feel: US novelists must now abandon social and theoretical glitter, says James Wood, The Guardian
|
|
|
|
Copyright 2008 BetterEditor.net
| |
