So begins a book review. I haven’t addressed how I anticipate to write these reviews, but two things are certain: they will be short and they will adapt over time, hopefully settling into the nook of some suitable format.

The crux of my writing ‘career’ was before I went to university. This is mostly because at university the specialisation I chose did not care much for written expressions on paper. With the little writing I did, no teacher chose to address my clear writing blunders and I traipsed through classes on good grades and grotesque habits. The sticky mountainous, cotton-candy fluff I stuffed into my writing mostly served to tire the reader out as they lugged through its sugary, pink nonesense - a sweet taste but you’ll feel terrible after the sugar crash. Steven Pinker has now prescribed me the remedy and I take frequent doses.

The Sense of Style targets those that want some common-sense answers for their writing style. A book that describes a topic well will develop what I call a lense for the topic. The lense is a hallmark of a memorable book. The author begins on a topic, be it the assemblage of verbs in a sentence or the anatomical structure of a bee’s wing, and will never once describe anything, but merely draw your attention to subtle intricacies and patterns on the subject. A wondrous lense will show you not a white wall, but the layers of plaster, the process of creating the paint, the sourcing of the wood, and the pleasing ratios of the wall to complement the architecture of the house. These lenses will reach into your brain and intrude on your ‘perspective channel’. Pinker has developed his lense well. When I have set this book down for the day, I find myself victim to monologophobia, documenting euphonious quotes, subconsciously deconstructing sentences in my head, and hunting for oddities in phrases of other books I read. I have not managed to disect these faux pas in my own writing (that comes with more practise - I hope), but I am now acutely aware of them.

The first few chapters of the The Sense of Style were essential and foundational. They give a nice overview of general mistakes in both sentence construction and coherence, along with some smart interjections of examples and case studies on the topic being discussed. Steven Pinker is a cognitive psychologist and it shows. He doesn’t justify his writing style from the citations of dusty, medieval monks, but instead logically arrives at sensible conclusions about grammar and vocabulary. The answers Pinker gives to many of the questions like, “who versus whom?” and “why should you not vary your words (too much)?” make sense to the general reader. Despite the book’s gentle style, the pages boast a large selection of vocabulary and if you are a marksman for new words, Pinker will boost your collection. But, if reading is a your luxury rather than your study, Pinker’s writing will comfortably lull you through treacherous word-waters.

After you have enjoyed the wonderful dialogue and flair of the book, you could, like me, be abruptly displeased by the final chapter. The liquid flow of the writing becomes a dry listing - as if someone has published buzzfeed articles as an excuse for a book format. I am somewhat cruel with that analogy because Pinker’s style is far more vivacious than the hell of internet memes, but it does feel as if the author ran out of space for half the points he wanted to make, proceeding to then compress five chapters worth of material into a meagre page per topic. Any illusion of the lense is shattered at this point in the book, but the last chapter remains a useful look-up table. His final remarks about factual writing helps to recover the drowsy ending. At a time when fake news is stuffed into our eye sockets, and medias are fighting for control of our ear holes, it would be wise to pay attention to the end of this book. As Mark Twain puts it (or is it actually Josh Billings?), “The trouble with the world is not that people know too little, but that they know so many things that aren’t so”. To close, I will certainly be reading another Steven Pinker book in the near future, not just for the lustrous composition, but also the fruitful content.

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The graphic at the top of this post: “The Book The Sense of Style By Steven Pinker” via VQGAN+CLIP.