Simple & Direct [Paperback]

Jacques Barzun (Author)

Book Description

Release date: December 18, 2001 | ISBN-10: 0060937238 | ISBN-13: 978-0060937232 | Edition: 4th

A fter a lifetime of writing and editing prose, Jacques Barzun has set down his view of the best ways to improve one's style. His discussions of diction, syntax, tone, meaning, composition, and revision guide the reader through the technique of making the written word clear and agreeable to read. Exercises, model passages both literary and casual, and hundreds of amusing examples of usage gone wrong show how to choose the right path to self-expression in forceful and distinctive words.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Rare is the book that causes one to consider--ponder? appraise? examine? inspect? contemplate?--one's every word. Simple & Direct, a classic text on the craft of writing by the educator Jacques Barzun, does so--with style. His object, says Barzun, is "to resensitize the mind to words." Do not use a word unless you know both its meaning and its connotations, its "quality" and its "atmosphere," and the ways in which it joins with other words. Barzun is an exacting taskmaster, railing against abstractions, "fancy" wordings, contemporary slang (which "prey[s] upon the vocabulary rather than nourish[es] it"), misprints ("it is rudeness to let them appear"), and the like. He bemoans what he sees as "a fury at work in the people to make war on hyphens," and he loathes those new words, such as condominium, that have been "cobbled together out of shavings and leftovers."

Still, no stodgy codger he. Barzun merely asks that you "have a point and make it by means of the best word." If that means splitting an infinitive or substituting a "which" for a "that," so be it. Just be sure that the decision to do so is conscious and informed. Once you've found the right word, you can move on to writing sentences and then leaning them against one another until they form paragraphs. Only when you've gotten it all down, says Barzun, should you allow yourself the pleasure of revision. "Unlike the sculptor," he says, "the writer can start carving and enjoying himself only after he has dug the marble out of his own head." --Jane Steinberg --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

About the Author

Born in France in 1907, Jacques Barzun came to the United States in 1920. After graduating from Columbia College, he joined the faculty of the university, becoming Seth Low Professor of History and, for a decade, Dean of Faculties and Provost. The author of some thirty books, including the New York Times bestseller From Dawn to Decadence, he received the Gold Medal for Criticism from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, of which he was twice president. He lived in San Antonio, Texas, before passing away at age 104.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial; 4th edition (December 18, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060937238
• ISBN-13: 978-0060937232
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #42,982 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #72 in Books > Education & Reference > Words, Language & Grammar > Reference

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 33 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A good guide to good prose April 20, 2002

By R. Jones

Format:Paperback

I taught newswriting as an adjunct in the journalism department of a state university for a couple of years, and Barzun's "Simple and Direct" was on a list of books and essays I strongly recommended to all my students.

I used to work as a radio news and documentary producer and news director and I found Barzun's prescriptions on prose style a reliable guide for editng my own work and others as well.

Barzun's approach can be a bit irritating at first because he tends to be fairly prissy about style, but if you can get past that, you begin to perceive the prissiness as a tight focus on precision of the type that is lacking in much modern prose writing.

His main rule is one I paraphrased at the first meeting of every newswriting class...that there are only two reasons for producing bad writing; either you don't know what you're writing about, or you don't know how to write about it.

I lost my copy of Barzun years ago. I think one of my students walked off with it. If so, I hope he or she is using it. I'm glad to know it's still available.

25 of 26 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars An Excellent Guide May 22, 2000

By W. A. Bussey

Format:Paperback

I read this book - twice. I am not an academic; I am a writer, and I find book to be not only useful but entertaining (as are most of Barzun's writings). As a writer he is careful and exact if not always concise. But even his lack of brevity has its merits; there is no misunderstanding what he is saying. I believe that only someone who has difficulty understanding the English language could call this book ". . .one of the worst books on English composition. . ." It is well written, well organized, and, although not always simple and direct, always complete, grammatically correct, and understandable.

As to another review, modern linguistic research has little to do with learning to produce a composition in English? Additonally in that review, the not-so-thinly veiled ad hominem attack on Barzun as being "pompous" and "nasty" has little to do with the merits of the book and do not constitute a review.

I certainly recommend the book for some excellent insight on how to write properly. Be prepared to work at it a bit, but that's as it should be; correct English writing requires some effort.

58 of 67 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Well, if you want to be particular... February 21, 2000

By George Formby

Format:Paperback

If one desires to mould one's prose around the lumpy and shifting shapes thrown up by statistical sampling -- in other words, according to the latest results of the human birdwatchers known as linguistics professors -- then don't read this book. But if you seek concision and character for your writing, and if you don't mind taking the advice of a very great though very old prose stylist, then read, and profit. It is short the fifth star only in order to save something for his "House of Intellect", "Berlioz" and "Science: The Glorious Entertainment".