View source for The Elements of Style

{{short description|American English writing style guide}}
{{Infobox book
| name              = The Elements of Style
| image             = Elements of Style cover.jpg
| caption           = First expanded edition (1959)
| author            = {{Plainlist|1=
* [[William Strunk Jr.]] (1918/1920)
* and [[E. B. White]] (1959)
}}
| illustrator       = [[Maira Kalman]] (2005 only)
| cover_artist      = 
| country           = United States
| language          = 
| series            = 
| subject           = American English [[style guide]]
| genre             = 
| publisher         = {{Plainlist|1=
* [[Harcourt Brace|Harcourt, Brace & Howe]] (1920)
* [[Macmillan Publishers (United States)|Macmillan]] (1959)
* [[Allyn & Bacon]] (1999)
}}
| pub_date          = <!--1918, 1920, 1959-->
| media_type        = Print ([[Paperback]])
| pages             = 43 (1918), 52 (1920), 71 (1959), 105 (1999)
| isbn              = 
| dewey             = 808/.042 21
| congress          = PE1421 .S7 (Strunk) <br />PE1408 .S772 (Strunk & White)
| oclc              = 27652766
| preceded_by       = 
| followed_by       = 
}}
{{Styles}}
'''''The Elements of Style''''' (often called '''''Strunk & White''')'' is a [[style guide]] for formal grammar used in [[American English]] writing. The first publishing was written by [[William Strunk Jr.]] in 1918, and published by [[Harcourt (publisher)|Harcourt]] in 1920, comprising eight "elementary rules of usage," ten "elementary principles of composition," "a few matters of form," a list of 49 "words and expressions commonly misused," and a list of 57 "words often misspelled." Writer and editor [[E. B. White]] greatly enlarged and revised the book for publication by [[Macmillan Publishers|Macmillan]] in 1959. That was the first edition of the book, which ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' recognized in 2011 as one of the 100 best and most influential non-fiction books written in English since 1923.<ref name=Time>{{cite magazine |title=''Elements of Style'' |author=Skarda, Erin |magazine=All-Time 100 Nonfiction Books
|url=https://entertainment.time.com/2011/08/30/all-time-100-best-nonfiction-books/slide/elements-of-style-by-strunk-and-white/ |date=August 16, 2011 |publisher=[[Time, Inc.]] |access-date=2014-05-14 }}</ref> 

American wit [[Dorothy Parker]] said, regarding the book:{{blockquote|If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second-greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of ''The Elements of Style''. The first-greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they're happy.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/22/books/22elem.html|title='The Elements of Style' Turns 50|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=21 April 2009 |access-date=2015-04-10|last1=Roberts |first1=Sam }}</ref>}}

==History==
[[Cornell University]] [[English studies|English]] professor William Strunk Jr. wrote ''The Elements of Style'' in 1918 and privately published it in 1919, for use at the university. Harcourt republished it in 52-page format in 1920.{{Cn|date=October 2024}} Strunk and editor Edward A. Tenney later revised it for publication as ''The Elements and Practice of Composition'' (1935). In 1957, the style guide reached the attention of [[E.B. White]] at ''[[The New Yorker]]''. White had studied writing under Strunk in 1919 but had since forgotten "the little book" that he described as a "forty-three-page summation of the case for cleanliness, accuracy, and brevity in the use of English."  Weeks later, White wrote about Strunk's devotion to lucid English prose in his column.<ref name="white57">E. B. White, "Letter from the East", ''The New Yorker'', July 27, 1957, '''33''':23:[https://archives.newyorker.com/newyorker/1957-07-27/flipbook/035/ 35–36, 41–43]</ref><ref name="Style, p.xiii">{{cite book|last=Strunk|first=William Jr.|title=The Elements of Style|year=2009|publisher=Allyn and Bacon|location=Boston|isbn=978-0-205-31342-6|edition=5th|author2=White, E. B.|page=xiii|url=https://archive.org/details/elementsofs00stru}}</ref>

Strunk died in 1946.  [[Macmillan and Company]] subsequently commissioned White to revise ''The Elements'' for a 1959 edition. White's expansion and modernization of Strunk and Tenney's 1935 revised edition yielded the writing style manual informally known as "Strunk & White", the first edition of which sold about two million copies in 1959. More than ten million copies of three editions were later sold.<ref>Strunk and White (2009), p. x.</ref> Mark Garvey relates the history of the book in ''Stylized: A Slightly Obsessive History of Strunk & White's The Elements of Style'' (2009).<ref>{{cite book|author=Garvey, Mark|date=2009|title=Stylized: A Slightly Obsessive History of Strunk & White's The Elements of Style|publisher=Simon & Schuster|isbn=978-1-4165-9092-7|url=https://archive.org/details/stylizedslightly00garv}}</ref>

[[Maira Kalman]], who provided the illustrations for ''The Elements of Style Illustrated'' (2005, see below), asked [[Nico Muhly]] to compose a [[cantata]] based on the book. It was performed at the [[New York Public Library]] in October 2005.<ref>{{cite news|author=Eicher, Jeremy |date=October 21, 2005|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/19/arts/style-gets-new-elements.html |title='Style' Gets New Elements|work=The New York Times}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|author=Neary, Lynn |date=November 2, 2005|url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4985137|title='Elements of Style' Goes Beyond Words|work=NPR Books}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.laco.org/composer/359 |title=Nico Muhly |website=[[Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra]] |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140116124639/http://www.laco.org/composer/359 |archive-date=2014-01-16}}</ref>

[[Audiobook]] versions of ''The Elements'' now feature changed wording, citing "gender issues" with the original.<ref name="simply">{{cite book|title=The Elements of Style: 60 Minutes to Better Writing & Grammar (Unabridged Audiobook)|publisher=Simply Media|date=2008|quote=Gender issues, such as the exclusive use of "he", which was the standard in Strunk's day, have been changed to the modern usage of "his" or "her", "you", "they", or "the writer".}}</ref>

==Content==
Strunk concentrated on the cultivation of good writing and composition; the original 1918 edition exhorted writers to "omit needless words," use the [[active voice]], and employ [[Parallelism (grammar)|parallelism]] appropriately.<ref>Strunk and White (2009), p. 23.</ref>

The 1959 edition features White's expansions of preliminary sections, the "Introduction" essay (derived from his magazine story about Strunk), and the concluding chapter, "An Approach to Style," a broader, prescriptive guide to writing in English. He also produced the second (1972) and third (1979) editions of ''The Elements of Style'', by which time the book's length had extended to 85 pages.

The third edition of ''The Elements of Style'' (1979) features 54 points: a list of common word-usage errors; 11 rules of punctuation and grammar; 11 principles of writing; 11 matters of form; and, in Chapter V, 21 reminders for better style. The final reminder, the 21st, "Prefer the standard to the offbeat," is thematically integral to the subject of ''The Elements of Style'', yet it does stand as a discrete essay about writing lucid prose.<ref name="Style, p.xiii" /> To write well, White advises writers to have the proper mindset, that they write to please themselves, and that they aim for "one moment of felicity," a phrase by [[Robert Louis Stevenson]].<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TKptCkp-EjwC&q=%22one+moment+of+felicity%22+robert+louis+stevenson&pg=PA179|title=Manly Writing: Gender, Rhetoric, and the Rise of Composition|last=Brody|first=Miriam|date=1993|publisher=SIU Press|isbn=9780809316915|pages=179|language=en}}</ref> Thus Strunk's 1918 recommendation:

{{blockquote|Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that he make every word tell. |"Elementary Principles of Composition", ''The Elements of Style''<ref>{{cite book |author=William Strunk |title=The Elements of Style |year=1918}}</ref>}}

Strunk Jr.  no longer has a comma in his name in the 1979 and later editions, due to the modernized style recommendation about punctuating such names.

The fourth edition of ''The Elements of Style'' (1999) omits Strunk's advice about masculine pronouns: "unless the antecedent is or must be feminine".<ref>{{cite book |last=Strunk |first = William |author2=E. B. White |title = The Elements of Style |publisher = Plain Label Books |edition = 2nd |orig-year=1959 |year = 1972 |pages = 55–56 |isbn = 978-1-60303-050-2 |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Hd5o74IehyoC&pg=PA55 |access-date = 2009-07-23}}</ref> In its place, the book reads, "many writers find the use of the generic ''he'' or ''his'' to rename indefinite antecedents limiting or offensive." The re-titled entry "They. He or She", in Chapter IV: Misused Words and Expressions, advises the writer to avoid an "unintentional emphasis on the masculine".<ref name="Strunk-1999-p60">{{cite book |last = Strunk |first = William |author2 = E. B. White |title = The Elements of Style |publisher = Allyn & Bacon |location = Boston |edition = 4th |orig-year = 1959 |year = 1999 |page = [https://archive.org/details/elementsofs00stru/page/60 60] |isbn = 978-0-205-31342-6 |oclc = 41548201 |url = https://archive.org/details/elementsofs00stru/page/60 |access-date = 2009-07-23 }}</ref><ref>Compare [[s:The Elements of Style/Misuse#They.|entry "They."]] in Chapter IV of the 1918 edition. See also [[preferred gender pronoun|gender-specific pronoun]]s.</ref>

Components new to the fourth edition include a foreword by essayist and E. B. White stepson [[Roger Angell]], a glossary, and an index. Five years later, the fourth edition text was re-published as ''The Elements of Style Illustrated'' (2005), with illustrations by the designer [[Maira Kalman]].

==Reception==
''The Elements of Style'' was listed as one of the 100 best and most influential non-fiction books written in English since 1923 by ''[[Time magazine|Time]]'' in its 2011 list.<ref name=Time/> Upon its release, Charles Poor, writing for ''[[The New York Times]]'', called it "a splendid trophy for all who are interested in reading and writing."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/books/97/08/03/lifetimes/white-strunk.html |title=Books of the Times |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=1959-06-09 |access-date=2015-04-10}}</ref> 

In ''[[On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft|On Writing]]'' (2000, p.&nbsp;11), [[Stephen King]] writes: "There is little or no detectable [[bullshit]] in that book. (Of course, it's short; at eighty-five pages it's much shorter than this one.) I'll tell you right now that every aspiring writer should read ''The Elements of Style''. Rule 17 in the chapter titled Principles of Composition is 'Omit needless words.' I will try to do that here."

In 2011, University of Vienna professor in biochemistry Tim Skern argued in ''Writing Scientific English: A Workbook'' that ''The Elements of Style'' "remains the best book available on writing good English".<ref>Skern, Tim (2011). . (UTB 3112) Vienna (facultas.wuv). p. 35.</ref>

In 2013, [[Nevile Gwynne]] reproduced ''The Elements of Style'' in his work ''[[Gwynne's Grammar]]''. Britt Peterson of ''[[The Boston Globe]]'' wrote that his inclusion of the book was a "curious addition".<ref>Britt Peterson (31 August 2014). [https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/08/30/why-love-language-police/AL7pZtx1StOOyz5VaeYkPI/story.html "Why we love the language police"]. ''The Boston Globe''. Retrieved 9 January 2015.</ref>

In 2016, the [[Open Syllabus Project]]<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://opensyllabusproject.org/faq/ |title=FAQ – the Open Syllabus Project |access-date=2016-02-05 |archive-date=2016-02-04 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160204013011/http://opensyllabusproject.org/faq/ |url-status=dead }}</ref> lists ''The Elements of Style'' as the most frequently assigned text in US academic [[syllabus]]es, based on an analysis of 933,635 texts appearing in over 1 million syllabuses.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://explorer.opensyllabusproject.org/|title=The Open Syllabus Project|website=explorer.opensyllabusproject.org}}</ref>

Criticism of ''Strunk & White'' has largely focused on claims that it has a [[Linguistic prescriptivism|prescriptivist]] nature, or that it has become a general anachronism in the face of modern English usage.  In criticizing ''The Elements of Style'', [[Geoffrey Pullum]], professor of [[linguistics]] at the [[University of Edinburgh]], and co-author of ''[[The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language]]'' (2002), said that: {{blockquote|The book's toxic mix of [[Linguistic purism|purism]], [[atavism]], and personal [[eccentricity (behavior)|eccentricity]] is not underpinned by a proper grounding in English grammar. It is often so misguided that the authors appear not to notice their own egregious flouting of its own rules&nbsp;... It's sad. Several generations of college students learned their grammar from the uninformed bossiness of ''Strunk and White'', and the result is a nation of educated people who know they feel vaguely anxious and insecure whenever they write ''however'' or ''than me'' or ''was'' or ''which'', but can't tell you why.<ref name="pullum-50years">{{cite journal | last=Pullum | first=Geoffrey K. | author-link=Geoffrey Pullum | date=April 17, 2009 | title=50 Years of Stupid Grammar Advice | journal=[[The Chronicle of Higher Education]] | volume=55 | issue=32 | pages=B15 | url=http://chronicle.com/article/50-Years-of-Stupid-Grammar/25497 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160413043333/https://www.chronicle.com/article/50-Years-of-Stupid-Grammar/25497 | archive-date=2016-04-13 | access-date=2017-11-27 | url-status=dead }}</ref>}}

Pullum has argued, for example, that the authors misunderstood what constitutes the [[English passive voice|passive voice]], and he criticized their proscription of established and unproblematic English usages, such as the [[split infinitive]] and the use of ''which'' in a restrictive [[English relative clause#That or which|relative clause]].<ref name="pullum-50years"/> On ''[[Language Log]]'', a blog about language written by [[linguists]], he further criticized ''The Elements of Style'' for promoting [[linguistic prescriptivism]] and [[hypercorrection]] among [[Anglophones]], and called it "the book that ate America's brain".<ref>Pullum, Geoffrey (2009). "[http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1505 Sotomayor loves Strunk and White]" (June 12).  "[http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1485 Drinking the Strunkian Kool-Aid]" (June 6). "[http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1369 Room for debate on Strunk and White]" (April 25). Retrieved 2009-06-13. <br />&nbsp; See also [http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?cat=5 "prescriptivist poppycock"] (tag): other postings on the subject by Pullum, [[Mark Liberman]], and others.</ref>

Jan Freeman, reviewing for ''[[The Boston Globe]]'' in 2005 described the latest edition of ''The Elements of Style Illustrated'' (2005), with illustrations by Maira Kalman, as an "aging zombie of a book&nbsp;... a hodgepodge, its now-antiquated [[pet peeve]]s jostling for space with 1970s taboos and 1990s computer advice".<ref>{{cite news |last=Freeman |first=Jan |date=October 23, 2005 |title=Frankenstrunk |url=http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2005/10/23/frankenstrunk |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051027010404/http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2005/10/23/frankenstrunk |archive-date=2005-10-27 |access-date=2025-09-06 |newspaper=[[The Boston Globe]]}} {{subscription required}}<!--2014-05-14--></ref>

==Editions==
===Strunk===
* ''The Elements of Style''. Composed in 1918 and [[privately printed]] in 1919. 43 pages. {{OCLC|6589433}}.
* ''The Elements of Style''. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Howe, 1920. 52-page publication of the original. {{OCLC|919826229}}

Because Strunk's text is now in the [[public domain]], publishers can and do reprint it.

===Strunk & Edward A. Tenney===
* ''The Elements and Practice of Composition''. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1935. {{OCLC|781988921}} (Despite the new title, it is a revision of ''The Elements of Style''. Tenney was a fellow instructor at Cornell.  This edition included student exercises.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Garvey |first=Mark |date=January 2010 |title=Word Perfect |url=https://cornellalumnimagazine.com/word-perfect/ |access-date=2024-10-08 |website=Cornell Alumni Magazine}}</ref>)

===Strunk & White===
* [https://archive.org/details/elementsofstyle0000unse_j8x6/page/n3/ ''The Elements of Style'']. New York: Macmillan, 1959. {{OCLC|878906498}}.
* [https://archive.org/details/elementsofstyle0000stru/page/n5/ ''The Elements of Style'']. 2nd ed. New York: Macmillan; London: Collier-Macmillan, 1972. {{ISBN|0024182605}}.
* [https://archive.org/details/lccn_780184443/page/n5/ ''The Elements of Style'']. 3rd ed. New York: Macmillan, 1979. {{ISBN|0024181900}} (hardback), {{ISBN|0024182001}} (paperback).
* ''The Elements of Style''. 4th ed. S.l.: Longman, 1999. Hardback. {{ISBN|0-205-31342-6}} (hardback). S.l.: Longman, 2000. {{ISBN|0-205-30902-X}} (paperback). With a foreword by [[Roger Angell]].
* ''The Elements of Style''. Fiftieth Anniversary Edition. New York: Pearson Longman, 2009. {{ISBN|0-205-63264-5}}. (Contains 4th ed. text)

===Illustrated edition===
* ''The Elements of Style Illustrated''. With illustrations by [[Maira Kalman]]. Penguin, 2005. {{ISBN|1-594-20069-6}} (hardback). Penguin, 2005. {{ISBN|9780910301961}} (hardback). Penguin. {{ISBN|9780143112723}} (paperback).  Penguin, 2008. {{ISBN|9781439562635}} (paperback).

==See also==
* ''[[A Dictionary of Modern English Usage]]'' (1926) by [[H. W. Fowler]]
* ''[[The Complete Plain Words]]'' (1954) by [[Sir Ernest Gowers]]
* ''[[Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace]]'' (1981) by [[Joseph M. Williams]]
Several books were titled paying homage to Strunk's, for example:

* ''[[The Elements of Programming Style]]''
* ''[[The Elements of Typographic Style]]''

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
{{Wikisource|The Elements of Style|The Elements of Style (Strunk 1918)}}
{{wikiquote}}
* {{gutenberg|no=37134}} (Strunk 1918)
* {{librivox book|title=The Elements of Style|author=William Strunk}} (Strunk 1918)
* [http://vrici.lojban.org/~cowan/style-revised.html Self-published revised edition based on Strunk's original 1918 text] (2006–2008), written by [[John W. Cowan]], a programmer.
* {{cite news|url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9842701/|title=None of Us Is Perfect (archived 2007)|magazine=[[Newsweek]]|date=Oct 28, 2005|quote=''The Elements of Style,'' the classic manual for clear writing, re-emerges as a hip new tome and an avant-garde musical piece.|archive-date=September 10, 2007|access-date=November 17, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070910151358/http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9842701/|url-status=bot: unknown}}
* [https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4985137 "'Elements of Style' Goes Beyond Words" (2005)] from [[National Public Radio|NPR]], discussing illustrated ''Strunk & White'' book and the musical adaptation by Nico Muhly
* [[Catherine Prendergast]]: "[https://web.archive.org/web/20130521234548/http://www.english.illinois.edu/-people-/faculty/schaffner/teaching/fall2010/505/readings/Prendergast.Unabomber.pdf The Fighting Style: Reading the Unabomber's Strunk and White (archived 2005)]", ''[[College English]]'', Volume 72, Number 1, September 2009.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Elements Of Style, The}}
[[Category:1918 non-fiction books]]
[[Category:Style guides for American English]]
[[Category:Works by E. B. White]]
[[Category:Self-published books]]
[[Category:Composition (language)]]