The Elements of Style
The Elements of Style is a style guide to writing American English, published in numerous editions. The original was written by William Strunk Jr. in 1918, and published by 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 in 1959. That was the first edition of the so-called Strunk & White, which Time recognized in 2011 as one of the 100 best and most influential books written in English since 1923.
First expanded edition (1959) | |
| Author |
|
|---|---|
| Illustrator | Maira Kalman (2005 only) |
| Country | United States |
| Subject | American English style guide |
| Publisher |
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| Media type | Print (Paperback) |
| Pages | 43 (1918), 52 (1920), 71 (1959), 105 (1999) |
| OCLC | 27652766 |
| 808/.042 21 | |
| LC Class | PE1421 .S7 (Strunk) PE1408 .S772 (Strunk & White) |
American wit Dorothy Parker said, regarding the book:
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.