Ben Yagoda: The Sound on the Page. Style and Voice in Writing. NY: HarperCollins, 2004. 267 pp.
For Ben Yagoda, writing is something spiritual, such that when it is done well, it deserves to be regarded with reverence. That said, he is unafraid of getting into the nitty-gritty of stylistic questions, such as: What precisely makes this paragraph, this sentence, this word better than that?
Among his stimulating and provocative suggestions: “I am convinced that there is only one specific, consistently reliable tip writers in training can be given: read your stuff aloud, if not literally, then with an inner voice attended to by the inner ear.” (pg. 36) “In the course of writing this book, I have found that because it forces you to slow down, simply copying a passage is a great way – much better than mere reading – of internalizing an author’s sensibility and cadences.” (pg. 229) I would add that while copying is excellent if you want to learn about an author’s style from the inside, as it were, the advice about reading your own stuff out loud should be taken quite literally, for when it comes to a text to be presented orally, the inner ear alone is not enough. Read it aloud and, without stopping for corrections, make a marginal tick wherever your tongue trips you up. Those are the passages that need to be worked on.
Rather than simply pontificate about how one should write, Yagoda had the bright idea of first consulting the experts, and so decided to “identify some writers with a strong style, seek them out, and ask them questions.” (pg. xxvii) The result is a book that, whatever else it may be, is also a collection of provocative observations, beginning with the ancients but concentrating mainly on contemporary writers. Along the way he writes perceptively about Hemingway’s “strategic plainness,” saying that it “has many of the characteristics of speech but doesn’t really emulate it.” (pg. 57) That’s why it’s not as easy as one might think for actors to speak his dialogue in movies.
In the end, this book succeeds largely because of the quality and range of the authors Yagoda interviewed. Somehow he managed to persuade them to open up about their likes and dislikes, about who influenced and inspired them, resulting in an anthology of their ruminations. In the process he elicited a remarkable confession from John Updike: “In general I am comfortable,” a tossed-out remark which to me says a lot about this particular author and his smugness. (pg. 164)
Nor does he restrict himself to representatives of high literary art – he can interview a humorist like Dave Barry, comment on the “middle style” of Oliver Sacks, or select the “mot juste” from an opinion by Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, and do so in a humorous, not-at-all pedantic way, which is tougher than it sounds. (It’s a shame he did not talk to any screenplay authors – an omission he partially corrects in his subsequent book, The Parts of Speech.)
Yagoda also takes full advantage of the circumstance that he happened to be present at a transitional moment in the history of writing: the shift from typewriting to word-processing, which will leave future historians with many fewer first drafts to look at. By the same token, the transition from telephoning to e-mailing to instant messaging means these same historians may well have much more written ephemera to work with.
Though many of his assertions are thought-provoking, the effect is marred at times by his tendency to highlight his own style, in the process quoting – by way of illustration – from sentences of his we have just read. And though he admits to past stylistic sinning, most of the personal examples he provides are meant as object lessons in How to Write Well. He criticizes self-indulgence – in others. When it comes to his own prose, he cannot forbear pointing out where he has refrained from self-indulgence. We would regard him somewhat more, perhaps, if he did not demonstrate such regard himself.
If one is going to talk about good style, obviously one has to mention the bad as well. Here it must be said Yagoda picks some rather easy targets. Who reads – or has even heard of – Charles Doughty or Henry Green? Everyone has heard of Gertrude Stein and Samuel Beckett, of course, but they are safely dead and gone. Cynthia Ozick confesses her dislike of Hemingway, and James Wolcott criticizes other writers without taking the risk of naming any of them. Only Martin Amis happily hands out flunking grades to scribblers left and right. Surely Yagoda must have his own living candidates for the academy of the overrated, but except for potshots at the likes of Michael Crichton and John Grisham, he never targets a widely esteemed contemporary. Between these covers, almost all the writers are above average.
All except William Strunk and E.B. White, that is. They are subjected to criticism as relentless as it is unjust. To repeat what other reviewers have already pointed out, Yagoda misconstrues the purpose of Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style in order to make it serve as his punching bag. In the process he overlooks a key word in its title: These are the “elements” of style, the basic building blocks that an inexperienced writer needs, not tips on how to polish your unique, personal way with prose. Elements is meant for novices who first have to purge their bad habits before they can develop their own voice. Stephen King: “I’ll tell you right now that every aspiring writer should read The Elements of Style.”
That work’s genesis is instructive here: It was conceived decades ago as a handbook for American undergraduates who had not received proper instruction in high school. So of course it was never meant for the established writer. Incidentally, Yagoda does find an ally of sorts in Harold Bloom, author of a self-described “eight-hundred-page monster” – modestly entitled Genius – that does not have a single paragraph that could “pass muster in Strunk and White.” (pg. xxi) Bloom brings to mind nothing so much as “a windbag – but highly educated, mighty high.” (Burt Lancaster in “The Kentuckian”) If a learned gasbag like Bloom disapproves, what further recommendation does one need for S&W’s slim volume?
In sum, this book is definitely worth adding to your private library. Put it on the shelf right next to Strunk and White.
Update:
“As Bloom has settled into this second career, so his old virtues have gradually fallen from him. An extraordinary amount of the work of the last decade is luxurious with padding and superfluity; there is hardly a book of his that would not have been better off as an essay. He is not a critic anymore, but a populist appreciator.” — James Wood, “The Misreader”
Of related interest elsewhere at this site: Ben Yagoda: When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It; Stephen King, On Writing.
© Hamilton Beck
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