Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In this collection of literary case studies, Clark (How to Write Short) dispenses warm and witty advice on how to uncover hidden layers of meaning in classic and contemporary literature. Clark moves through his close readings expertly and rapidly, often beginning with his personal history; for instance, he admits that The Great Gatsby was lost on him at first, though it won him over on successive readings. Clark's enthusiasm and expertise could seduce any reader to read (or reread) a text. Clark has assembled a diverse canon, including works as ancient as The Canterbury Tales and as recent as Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad. At the conclusion, he gives readers the opportunity to apply what they've learned to a series of standalone excerpts from the books he's mentioned, giving his own interpretations on the back of the page. This is an infectiously enthusiastic guide to becoming an active reader, an homage to the wealth of meaning in great literature, and a striking demonstration of how that meaning can be transmitted from author to reader across centuries and oceans. Agent: Jane Dystel, Dystel & Goderich. (Jan.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Clark (How To Write Short; The Glamour of Grammar) wants to improve your writing. How? By showing you how to read-really read. Students of literature will be familiar with the notion of close or active reading, but Clark takes it one step further: recommending readers engage with details, word choice, repetition, even sentence length to glean insight from great (and not so great) writers. He invites readers to ask: "How did they do that?" and dig to find the spark that marks memorable writing. Each chapter homes in on a particular work or writer, providing a close analysis of the text. Clark moves beyond criticism to consider the nuances that make for great prose, presenting these in a series of easy-to-follow, practical lessons that make you want to delve into works such as F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, Vladimir Nobokav's Lolita, Shakespeare's sonnets, and more, until you, too, see them with Clark's x-ray vision. -VERDICT This enjoyable book is perfect for students, writers, and anyone who wants to learn more about great literature.-Gricel -Dominguez, Florida International Univ. Lib. © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Just when you think Poynter Institute senior scholar Clark, who has written some of the best books on the writer's craft, has covered everything related to the subject, he digs deep into literature and excavates a gold mine of artistic strategies for great writing. While his last book, How to Write Short (2013), examined pithy prose in today's ubiquitous media, this illuminating volume focuses on superb writing through the centuries. Readers may not consider the work of ancient poets Homer and Virgil as examples of cinematic writing, but these scribes, who zoom in and out of scenes with words, have a lot to teach us. Clark cites a passage from Virgil's The Aeneid that describes a raging storm at sea, noting that centuries "before anyone dreamed of the aerial shot orspecial effectsthere was Virgil creating in language the vertiginous seascape of the drowning sailors." Clark also has a flair for language as he describes one of Virgil's "amazing" sentences as "coiling and uncoiling like the serpents it describes, directing our eyes back and forth, in and out, from the action of the serpents to the movements of the sea, then close enough to see eyes of blood and fire." The Great Gatsby yields an intricately built architecture in which F. Scott Fitzgerald plants "strategic treasures"words and imagesat the end of his first chapter that are echoed in the luminous, oft-quoted last four paragraphs of the novel. Flannery O'Connor's short stories, writes Clark, school us in the uses of foreboding and foreshadowing. Gustave Flaubert employed small gestures and domestic details to reveal Emma Bovary's frame of mind. In The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer demonstrates poetic flow in his ecstatic descriptions of spring. Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye offers the lyrical use of repetition, not to be confused with redundancy. With lively, colorful writing and inspired practical advice, this guide earns a spot along with Clark's Writing Tools (2006) as essential reading for writers. Recommended for book lovers as well. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
