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CHAPTER
Improving
Sentence Style
Revising for Variety
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No one likes to read dull writing—not your cousin in Chicago, not
your chemistry teacher, and not your colleagues at work. Whether you
are writing a personal letter, a report on ions, or a memo about timesaving techniques, a versatile writing style will help you convey your
message with punch and pizazz.
As you learn to evaluate and revise your writing, you can develop
an eye for sentence style. The next time you draft an essay, examine
how your sentences fit together. Do they add up to lively, naturalsounding paragraphs? If your writing sounds dull, you probably need
to vary the beginnings and the structures of some of your sentences.
Notice how the varied sentences below work together to form a
smooth, effective passage.
Beyond the stream, the river calmed into a long,
wide pool. We stopped paddling for a time and turned
to see the setting sun dye river and sky in crimson. Air
and water seemed all one, of one color and translucence.
The wind had died; a great stillness enveloped us. We
rested together, drifting slowly backward through fiery
waters, content simply to gaze as the red waters of the
river slipped away into reddening skies, briefly
obstructed by a dark silhouetted line of leafless trees on
the far bank.
Steve Faulkner, “Common Water,”
DoubleTake
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Improving Sentence Style
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Varying Sentence Beginnings
Most sentences begin with a subject followed by a verb.
EXAMPLES
Canoeing is a popular activity.
Some people prefer kayaking to canoeing.
While there is nothing wrong with this basic subject-verb pattern, it
can begin to sound monotonous after a while. You can improve the
style of your writing by beginning some sentences with introductory
words, phrases, and clauses instead of with subjects. At the same time,
you can make more effective connections between related sentences.
In each example below, the first version is clear. However, the second
version brings the ideas into sharper focus by shifting the emphasis.
BLAND
BETTER
BLAND
BETTER
Bernice won the sculpting contest. She told her best friend Emi
as soon as she found out.
Bernice won the sculpting contest. As soon as she found out,
she told her best friend Emi.
Emi was happy for Bernice. She told Ari the good news over the
phone.
Emi was happy for Bernice. Over the phone, she told Ari the
good news.
Sometimes the best way to vary sentence beginnings is to reduce a
short sentence to an introductory word, phrase, or clause and attach it
to another sentence. This is where your sentence-combining skills
come in handy.
BLAND
BETTER
BLAND
BETTER
Reference Note
For more about combining sentences, see
page 444.
Emi kept Ari on the phone for an hour. She is talkative and
sociable.
Talkative and sociable, Emi kept Ari on the phone for an
hour.
Ari was excited to hear that Bernice had won. He wanted to
congratulate her.
Excited to hear that Bernice had won, Ari wanted to congratulate her.
N O T E Remember that there are many ways to combine sentences. In
the second bland example above, another acceptable way to combine
the two sentences would be Ari was excited to hear that Bernice had
won and wanted to congratulate her.
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The following chart gives some examples of how to vary sentence
beginnings.
Varying Sentence Beginnings
Sentence
Connectives
A tropism is a growth response in which the
direction a plant grows is determined by a
particular stimulus. Consequently, phototropisms are growth responses to light.
The growth of a plant toward light is called
positive phototropism. However, the
growth of a plant’s roots away from light is
called negative phototropism.
A plant demonstrating
phototropism.
Appositives
and Appositive
Phrases
Another example of this phenomenon,
gravitropism, is the growth of a plant
in response to gravity.
An example of positive gravitropism, the
downward growth of roots, occurs frequently.
Single-Word
Modifiers
Strangely, some plants respond to touch.
Phrase
Modifiers
From the window of my kitchen, I can see
many types of plants.
Curly and green, grapevines grow in response
to touch and are therefore thigmotropic.
Looking closely, I noticed that most of the
plants were in need of water.
To address this problem, I went outside
and watered the plants.
Clause
Modifiers
Because I noticed the situation in time, I
was able to keep the plants from dying.
Although I am not the best gardener, I
am eager to learn more about plants.
NOTE
Sentence connectives such as and, but, and however can help you
make transitions between ideas. Usually, these connecting words link
ideas within a sentence. Sometimes, though—especially in informal
writing—they are used at the beginning of a sentence for variety and
emphasis. For example, notice how the writer uses a sentence
connective for emphasis in the following passage.
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Improving Sentence Style
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It’s crunch time for Julie Shama. Like thousands of high
school seniors, she faces college-application deadlines in
the next month. Julie’s counselor at Brookline High, outside
Boston, and her $300-a-session private college-application
advisor are helpful. But they can’t match the resources of
the Internet.
T. Trent Gegax, “www.Apply-Here.com,”
Newsweek
Use sentence connectives sparingly and carefully to begin sentences.
When you use them, be sure that the connective shows the appropriate
relationship between your ideas. Also, note that in formal writing it is
best not to begin sentences with coordinating conjunctions such as
and and but.
Exercise 1
Varying Sentence Beginnings
Revise each of the following sentences so that it begins with an appositive,
an appositive phrase, a single-word modifier, a phrase modifier, or a
clause modifier.
The Granger Collection, New York
1. African Americans, many experiencing great hardships,
played an important role during the Revolutionary War.
2. George Washington ordered at the beginning of the war
that no African American soldiers could serve in the
Continental Army.
3. The Continental Army’s troops, poorly trained and
prone to disease, were also few in number.
4. The British army also suffered a shortage of troops, and
the British made plans to recruit African Americans into
their army in 1775.
5. Washington ordered the Continental Army to enlist free
blacks to counter this move.
6. Many African Americans served in units with European
Americans, and others served in separate African
American companies.
7. Most commanders of the all-black companies were white,
and many of these commanders were reluctant to lead the
groups at first.
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8. These commanders later changed their minds because of the
notable courage of many African American troops.
9. African American soldiers, numbering about 5,000, helped win the
Revolutionary War.
10. A few black soldiers received official recognition for their outstanding bravery, although many soldiers’ heroic efforts went
unacknowledged.
Varying Sentence Structure
Reference Note
For more information
about the four types of
sentence structures, see
page 588.
When you revise your writing for style, it is not always enough to vary
your sentence beginnings. It is also important to vary sentence structures by using a mix of simple, compound, complex, and sometimes
compound-complex sentences.
Read the following short paragraph, which contains only simple
sentences.
Quasars are the brightest, most distant
objects in the sky. For decades they have puzzled and intrigued astronomers. Quasars may
hold important clues to the birth and formation of galaxies. Astronomers believe this.
Astronomers first observed quasars in 1963.
Since then, they have discovered over one
thousand of these objects. With the help of
two segmented-mirror telescopes in Hawaii,
astronomers hope to discover the power source
of quasars. According to some astronomers,
giant black holes produce the energy.
Now, read the revised version of the paragraph. Notice how the
writer has made the paragraph smoother by including a variety of sentence structures.
Quasars are the brightest, most distant
objects in the sky. For decades they have puzzled and intrigued astronomers, who believe
quasars may hold important clues to the birth
and formation of galaxies. Astronomers first
observed quasars in 1963, and since then, they
have discovered over one thousand of these
objects. With the help of two segmented-mirror
telescopes in Hawaii, astronomers hope to discover the power source of quasars, which some
believe to be giant black holes.
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Improving Sentence Style
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Complex sentences do more than add variety to your writing.
They also help bring your thoughts into focus by emphasizing main
ideas and subordinating less important ones. For example, in the
revised paragraph, notice how the complex sentence at the end establishes a clear connection between the last two ideas. The relative pronoun in the subordinate clause relates the information in that clause to
quasars, the object of the preceding clause.
Exercise 2
For more about subordinating ideas in sentences, see page 421.
Varying Sentence Structure
The following paragraph contains too many simple sentences. Improve
the paragraph by varying the structure of the sentences. You can add,
delete, or rearrange words as needed.
Kent is a county in southern England. It is
known as “the garden of England” because of its
lush and serene countryside. Sir Thomas Wyatt
wrote fondly about Kent. Wyatt introduced the
sonnet to England. Wyatt lists the unbearable
faults of other European countries in one poem.
He also praises the virtues of Kent in this
poem. Kent has lovely hills and fields, old villages, and abundant flowers in the spring. Kent
has these today just as it did in Wyatt’s time.
The historic town of Canterbury lies in Kent.
Canterbury was made famous by Geoffrey Chaucer’s
tales. A journey through Kent rewards the visitor. The visitor enjoys history, as well as
robust food and beautiful country.
Review A
Reference Note
C OM P U T E R T I P
When you print out a draft
to revise, use double- or
triple-line spacing and wide
margins to allow room for
handwritten corrections.
Then, when you are ready
to print a final copy,
remember to reset the
spacing and margins.
Varying Sentence Beginnings and
Sentence Structure
Using what you have learned about varying sentence beginnings and
sentence structure, revise the following paragraph for style. Add,
delete, and rearrange words wherever necessary to make the sentences
more varied.
Extreme sports are growing increasingly
popular with television viewers. Extreme
sports are called extreme because they require
great physical agility and, often, risk.
Extreme sports include surfing, skateboarding,
snowboarding, and mountain biking, among other
sports. Traditional sports such as basketball,
STYLE
When revising for style, be
careful to retain the meaning you wish to convey.
After you have made revisions, remember to re-read
what you have written
aloud purely for sense.
Revising for Variety
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football, and baseball used to dominate the
television ratings. Many athletes in traditional sports, with their big salaries and bad
attitudes, have alienated viewers. Some viewers think that extreme sports athletes take
their sports more seriously because they do
not participate in them just for money.
Extreme sports are especially popular with
young viewers. Television analysts say that
the traditional three-sport era may be over
for good.
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for an interactive activity.
TIPS
&
TRICKS
When revising for wordiness, look for the following
two types of problems:
• Redundant Pairs—words
that imply each other
EXAMPLES
true facts
future plans
• Redundant Categories—
words that designate
their general categories
EXAMPLES
engineering field
Revising to Reduce Wordiness
Which would you rather read: a ten-page essay on the health benefits of
broccoli or a one-or-two-paragraph statement on the subject? Skilled
writers make every word count, suiting length to purpose. Your writing
is most effective when it is clear, concise, and free of the clutter of unnecessary words. To avoid wordiness, keep these three points in mind.
•
•
•
Use only the words you need to make your point.
Avoid complicated words where simple ones will do.
Do not repeat words unless it is absolutely necessary.
Sometimes you can fix a wordy sentence by taking out whole
groups of unnecessary words. At other times you can revise by reducing clauses to phrases and both clauses and phrases to single words.
large in size
Eliminating Unnecessary Words
The following paragraph is an example of wordy writing. Lines have
been drawn through the unnecessary words. First, read the paragraph
aloud, including the words that have been crossed out. Then, read the
shorter, more concise version. Notice the difference the revisions make
in the sound of the paragraph.
Anyone who has ever in the course of his or
her life searched the World Wide Web knows how
time-consuming the process of searching can
be. Although helpful search engines can aid
you in finding what you are looking for, often
the specific information you seek remains
elusive and out of reach. At other times, a
search can yield far too much information and
458
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Improving Sentence Style
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