Author Styles

Introduction

The Six Traits of Writing are all about style.  Good writers develop their style by applying the traits in interesting ways with interesting vivid language.

What helps an author develop his/her own style?

Click Style to discover the techniques.

A Style Handout From ReadWriteThink ^[1]

Author Examples

How do authors use these style choices?  Read examples below.

Nathanial Hawhtorne, American Romantic Novelist, Excerpts

From CSPAN

From Random House  Chapters 1 and 2 Excerpts

Snowflakes

From The Gutenberg Project  Find a selection -- choose "Read Online" under the title.

Adapting Hawthorne's Style Information (from RWT)

About the Author

Ernest Hemingway, Nobel Prize in Literature 1954, Excerpts

From OceanStar on sharks  The Old Man and The Sea

From BookBrowse True At First Light

From Swarthmore: A Farewell to Arms

About the Author:

From PBS biography

From CSPAN biography

Understanding Style

Ok --What do these styles look like?  Are there some examples? -- How about an activity to help me?

Click to Examples and an activity to download and complete. (From ReadWriteThink ^[2])

Create a new page, respond to the activity, and to the following questions.

• What did you notice about Hemingway's or Hawthorne's writing that you didn't see before?
• What differences did you notice about the kinds of words that the author used?
• What differences did you notice about the kind of sentence patterns that the author used?
• Overall, how would you describe each author's style?

Review another team's page: What did you agree with? What could you add?

Applying Style: Translations

Could we try to translate styles of one author into another?

Sure!  Click here to download a fable activity. Find fables here.

Create a new page for your team responses.  Also respond to:

• What did you notice about the writing in the fables?
• What author author style did you try?
• What styles did you change in the fables? 
• What do you think is your best style change?  Why?

Read another team's translations. What styles did they apply?  What did you like?  What style suggestion could you make?

More Author Bookmarks

When you discover a good author style, add to our Author Bookmark page.  Provide author, title, style, sample, link (if available).

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