Legal Commentary

By Evan Schaeffer

WRITING CLINIC: STYLE . . .    Here's Updike's definition of a writer's style--

Style as I understand it is nothing less than the writer's habits of mind--it is not a kind of paint applied afterwards, but the very germ of the thing. One has certain models of excellence, certain standards of prose evolved with the hope sometimes of teachers and editors, and certain readerly expectations that one hopes, as a writer, to satisfy. Just as one's handwriting tends to come out the same every time, with certain quirks of emphasis and flow, so does one's writing, with its recurrent pet vocabulary and concerns.

As quoted in The Sound on the Page: Style and Voice in Writing, by Ben Yagoda.

Full post as published by Notes from the (Legal) Underground on April 22, 2010 (boomark / email).