1
00:00:02,410 --> 00:00:05,130
Hello everybody and welcome to the Style Academy.

2
00:00:05,489 --> 00:00:08,770
We hope you'll find the videos and the exercises on this

3
00:00:08,770 --> 00:00:11,810
website really useful to you as you develop as a writer.

4
00:00:12,810 --> 00:00:14,810
This one is on writing sentences.

5
00:00:16,139 --> 00:00:18,309
Now, this may not be the best,

6
00:00:18,719 --> 00:00:20,030
news to some of you out there,

7
00:00:20,120 --> 00:00:20,590
but

8
00:00:21,200 --> 00:00:23,629
you are going to be a writer throughout your life,

9
00:00:23,760 --> 00:00:25,840
no matter what profession you go into.

10
00:00:26,700 --> 00:00:30,209
And you're going to be writing a lot of different kinds of documents.

11
00:00:30,459 --> 00:00:31,700
You're going to be writing emails;

12
00:00:31,780 --> 00:00:33,419
you're gonna be writing reports,

13
00:00:33,540 --> 00:00:34,779
analysis papers,

14
00:00:34,939 --> 00:00:36,139
blog posts,

15
00:00:36,259 --> 00:00:37,299
proposals,

16
00:00:38,090 --> 00:00:38,790
love letters.

17
00:00:38,970 --> 00:00:39,490
Who knows?

18
00:00:40,689 --> 00:00:42,599
But every time you sit down to write,

19
00:00:42,849 --> 00:00:44,970
you're going to be writing sentences.

20
00:00:47,000 --> 00:00:47,689
And

21
00:00:48,400 --> 00:00:50,610
you can't really improve your writing

22
00:00:51,200 --> 00:00:54,549
until you can improve the way that you write a sentence.

23
00:00:55,500 --> 00:00:57,150
And that's what this lesson is all about.

24
00:00:58,299 --> 00:00:59,299
As you already know,

25
00:00:59,740 --> 00:01:03,209
sentences like the one you see now can be pretty simple,

26
00:01:04,899 --> 00:01:05,598
or

27
00:01:05,819 --> 00:01:07,378
they can be not so simple at all.

28
00:01:08,669 --> 00:01:11,900
Here is a gargantuan sentence from Virginia Woolf,

29
00:01:11,940 --> 00:01:16,269
and she's famous for writing gargantuan and lovely sentences.

30
00:01:17,080 --> 00:01:19,620
What I want you to do now is something you may not do very often,

31
00:01:19,709 --> 00:01:20,290
which is

32
00:01:20,660 --> 00:01:24,269
pause this video and read this sentence out loud.

33
00:01:24,800 --> 00:01:27,300
You may feel kind of weird because you're in a library

34
00:01:27,300 --> 00:01:29,819
or maybe you're sitting in your dorm room or something.

35
00:01:29,900 --> 00:01:30,970
I don't know where you are,

36
00:01:31,260 --> 00:01:31,940
but wherever you are,

37
00:01:32,019 --> 00:01:34,370
pause this and read this out loud

38
00:01:34,739 --> 00:01:38,169
and just listen to the way that Virginia Woolf makes this sentence,

39
00:01:38,540 --> 00:01:39,739
and then when we come back,

40
00:01:39,819 --> 00:01:42,610
we'll talk a little bit about it just for two seconds.

41
00:01:47,510 --> 00:01:47,940
OK.

42
00:01:48,059 --> 00:01:50,970
So, what kind of sentence artist is Virginia Woolf?

43
00:01:51,779 --> 00:01:53,769
I noticed that she begins by saying,

44
00:01:54,260 --> 00:01:56,139
"considering how common illness is..."

45
00:01:57,300 --> 00:02:00,910
and she never completes her idea until the end of the sentence.

46
00:02:01,300 --> 00:02:04,220
Everything in the middle is building upon that,

47
00:02:04,339 --> 00:02:06,080
putting more and more weight

48
00:02:06,459 --> 00:02:10,770
on the sentence until the very ending when she says "it becomes strange indeed that..."

49
00:02:11,100 --> 00:02:12,539
And that's the whole point of the sentence.

50
00:02:12,580 --> 00:02:16,289
That's the main clause of the sentence if that language helps you.

51
00:02:18,600 --> 00:02:20,139
So, in using Virginia Woolf,

52
00:02:20,210 --> 00:02:22,839
I'm not saying that you need to write like Virginia Woolf,

53
00:02:24,089 --> 00:02:26,660
and maybe you don't want to write like Virginia Woolf.

54
00:02:26,729 --> 00:02:28,350
I don't want to write like Virginia Woolf.

55
00:02:28,449 --> 00:02:29,490
I enjoy her writing,

56
00:02:29,529 --> 00:02:32,039
but I want to create my own sentence style

57
00:02:32,559 --> 00:02:34,679
that has my own stamp and my own

58
00:02:34,809 --> 00:02:39,410
attitude and my own persona and all those things that come into writing sentences.

59
00:02:39,570 --> 00:02:40,410
And you should too.

60
00:02:41,160 --> 00:02:45,850
So, one of the cool things about sentences is that they come in all kinds of varieties,

61
00:02:45,929 --> 00:02:46,919
as you see here.

62
00:02:48,919 --> 00:02:52,630
Now, I'd like to do an exercise with you that kind of demonstrates this point.

63
00:02:55,399 --> 00:02:57,550
You see two sentences on the screen.

64
00:02:57,880 --> 00:02:58,710
Myka sang,

65
00:02:59,039 --> 00:03:00,429
It surprised her mother.

66
00:03:01,600 --> 00:03:02,889
What I'd like you to do

67
00:03:03,179 --> 00:03:06,380
is combine these two sentences to make one sentence.

68
00:03:07,020 --> 00:03:10,750
And I want you to do it in as many different ways as you possibly can.

69
00:03:11,199 --> 00:03:14,710
Let's shoot for at least ten—ten unique sentences

70
00:03:14,710 --> 00:03:17,600
that combine these two sentences together into one.

71
00:03:18,350 --> 00:03:19,339
And here are a few rules.

72
00:03:19,820 --> 00:03:24,179
I get this exercise from Max Morenberg in his book "Doing Grammar."

73
00:03:25,750 --> 00:03:28,710
So, you can change sang to singing,

74
00:03:28,729 --> 00:03:32,580
or you can add commas or dashes or colons.

75
00:03:32,729 --> 00:03:39,559
You can also add adverbs or adverbials like since or because or in the afternoon

76
00:03:39,809 --> 00:03:40,880
or something like that,

77
00:03:41,089 --> 00:03:43,690
but just don't change the essence of these two sentences.

78
00:03:43,729 --> 00:03:44,380
OK?

79
00:03:44,690 --> 00:03:45,839
Put the two together,

80
00:03:46,210 --> 00:03:47,649
switch the order if you want,

81
00:03:47,889 --> 00:03:49,559
and come up with at least ten,

82
00:03:49,729 --> 00:03:50,770
and then come back to me.

83
00:03:54,750 --> 00:03:55,660
How did that go?

84
00:03:56,149 --> 00:03:57,429
Did you come up with at least ten?

85
00:03:59,380 --> 00:04:01,529
As I was playing around with these two sentences,

86
00:04:01,580 --> 00:04:02,770
I came up with

87
00:04:03,300 --> 00:04:03,779
these.

88
00:04:04,800 --> 00:04:07,759
You may have some of these very sentences on your paper.

89
00:04:09,319 --> 00:04:10,490
So, as I was writing things,

90
00:04:10,600 --> 00:04:14,029
I was thinking that I was pretty much writing the same thing over and over again,

91
00:04:14,089 --> 00:04:15,029
but actually,

92
00:04:15,240 --> 00:04:18,920
even changing the form changes a little bit of the

93
00:04:18,920 --> 00:04:20,910
content or what the content is trying to say.

94
00:04:21,480 --> 00:04:22,820
Like these two examples.

95
00:04:23,709 --> 00:04:25,420
Myka's singing surprised her mother,

96
00:04:25,459 --> 00:04:26,790
and if Myka sings,

97
00:04:26,869 --> 00:04:28,100
it surprises her mother.

98
00:04:29,179 --> 00:04:32,809
Those are two sentences saying very similar things,

99
00:04:33,140 --> 00:04:35,369
but the meaning is just a little bit different.

100
00:04:37,010 --> 00:04:41,149
Another amazing aspect of sentences is that with all these different options,

101
00:04:41,440 --> 00:04:43,549
rhetorical tricks and combinations,

102
00:04:43,839 --> 00:04:46,279
you can write sentences that no one has ever

103
00:04:46,279 --> 00:04:48,690
written before in the history of the universe.

104
00:04:49,839 --> 00:04:50,820
You don't believe me?

105
00:04:51,160 --> 00:04:52,420
Let's try one right now.

106
00:04:52,790 --> 00:04:53,100
So,

107
00:04:53,269 --> 00:04:54,549
I'm gonna write the sentence.

108
00:04:56,049 --> 00:04:59,369
"This afternoon, while working on these keynote slides,

109
00:04:59,489 --> 00:05:02,250
I'm listening to Feist and wondering if my wife

110
00:05:02,250 --> 00:05:05,040
Amy will plant more lantana in the front yard."

111
00:05:06,510 --> 00:05:07,640
It's not a work of art,

112
00:05:07,760 --> 00:05:12,079
but my guess is that no one has ever written this sentence in the history of the world.

113
00:05:13,380 --> 00:05:13,890
And in fact,

114
00:05:13,970 --> 00:05:14,690
I proved it.

115
00:05:14,850 --> 00:05:16,040
I Googled this,

116
00:05:16,609 --> 00:05:17,329
and look,

117
00:05:17,600 --> 00:05:18,559
no results found.

118
00:05:18,709 --> 00:05:20,089
No one's ever written this sentence.

119
00:05:23,010 --> 00:05:25,940
So, what can learning to write sentences do for you?

120
00:05:27,090 --> 00:05:29,190
Well, it can add variety

121
00:05:29,410 --> 00:05:30,239
to your language.

122
00:05:31,679 --> 00:05:34,049
And let's get a little bit more specific about that.

123
00:05:34,410 --> 00:05:36,410
Let's go back to our sentence Ben laughed.

124
00:05:37,600 --> 00:05:37,989
You know,

125
00:05:38,559 --> 00:05:42,109
what makes a sentence effective and artistic and

126
00:05:43,320 --> 00:05:43,959
various

127
00:05:44,890 --> 00:05:48,049
is when you can build on something simple like Ben laughed.

128
00:05:48,140 --> 00:05:49,320
So, here's an example.

129
00:05:50,429 --> 00:05:51,359
In the afternoon,

130
00:05:51,410 --> 00:05:52,540
after his soccer game,

131
00:05:52,730 --> 00:05:53,500
Ben laughed.

132
00:05:53,809 --> 00:05:55,760
We're gonna call that a sentence opener,

133
00:05:56,250 --> 00:05:57,920
and I've sort of given you a

134
00:05:57,929 --> 00:06:01,079
little schematic of that with those dashes and then the X.

135
00:06:01,230 --> 00:06:03,440
It's like da da da da da and then the main clause,

136
00:06:03,649 --> 00:06:04,549
Ben laughed.

137
00:06:04,690 --> 00:06:05,170
Bam!

138
00:06:06,510 --> 00:06:07,940
But you can also have

139
00:06:08,359 --> 00:06:11,589
build on a sentence by adding a closer.

140
00:06:11,920 --> 00:06:15,630
Ben laughed, and root beer shot out his nose in a wild gush.

141
00:06:17,459 --> 00:06:18,890
I've heard that some people,

142
00:06:19,019 --> 00:06:20,730
some linguists would say that the

143
00:06:20,739 --> 00:06:23,899
English language and maybe language in general

144
00:06:23,899 --> 00:06:27,029
emerges kind of in this sentence closer pattern.

145
00:06:27,600 --> 00:06:30,010
This is often called right branching.

146
00:06:30,260 --> 00:06:30,529
You see,

147
00:06:30,540 --> 00:06:34,890
you've got Ben laughed as the main clause and then things branch to the right of that

148
00:06:35,059 --> 00:06:36,350
as opposed to to the left.

149
00:06:36,790 --> 00:06:38,899
So, this is kind of a sentence closer and, you know,

150
00:06:39,100 --> 00:06:39,859
you add variety,

151
00:06:39,899 --> 00:06:41,769
you can change it actually to

152
00:06:42,100 --> 00:06:43,859
what's called a participial phrase.

153
00:06:43,940 --> 00:06:44,579
Ben laughed,

154
00:06:44,799 --> 00:06:46,899
shooting root beer out his nose in a wild gush.

155
00:06:48,130 --> 00:06:50,670
And then if you wanna get really fancy pants,

156
00:06:50,880 --> 00:06:52,910
you can use a sentence interrupter.

157
00:06:53,359 --> 00:06:53,709
Ben,

158
00:06:53,920 --> 00:06:56,109
my oldest and by far silious child,

159
00:06:56,279 --> 00:06:56,829
laughed.

160
00:06:57,149 --> 00:06:59,700
You can see the schematic there with those X's how

161
00:07:00,040 --> 00:07:01,670
the clause is interrupted.

162
00:07:02,040 --> 00:07:05,559
There'll be more of this kind of stuff in other places in the style academy.

163
00:07:07,269 --> 00:07:11,369
So, one of the many advantages of learning how to write effective sentences is

164
00:07:11,369 --> 00:07:15,369
that you're putting phrases and clauses together in a variety of different ways.

165
00:07:17,179 --> 00:07:19,589
You'll also learn how to write clear.

166
00:07:20,179 --> 00:07:21,850
Writing effective sentences

167
00:07:22,299 --> 00:07:24,980
means often writing clear sentences.

168
00:07:25,059 --> 00:07:26,410
So, you connect with your readers,

169
00:07:26,420 --> 00:07:27,489
so they don't have to go

170
00:07:27,940 --> 00:07:30,089
through too much labor reading your stuff.

171
00:07:31,059 --> 00:07:32,459
It also gives you power,

172
00:07:32,540 --> 00:07:36,010
rhetorical power to convince and persuade other people.

173
00:07:36,230 --> 00:07:39,299
Heck, it might even make you happy learning how to write effective sentences.

174
00:07:39,380 --> 00:07:39,929
I don't know.

175
00:07:42,369 --> 00:07:43,140
But,

176
00:07:43,390 --> 00:07:47,420
when you learn how to begin with something as simple as Ben laughed,

177
00:07:47,549 --> 00:07:49,420
and then build it to something like this,

178
00:07:50,350 --> 00:07:51,929
and then something like this,

179
00:07:53,519 --> 00:07:55,649
you develop rhetorical power as a writer.

180
00:07:59,420 --> 00:08:00,329
Before we finish,

181
00:08:00,540 --> 00:08:01,859
let's do one last exercise.

182
00:08:01,940 --> 00:08:02,299
OK?

183
00:08:06,790 --> 00:08:09,940
Take a look at this sentence written by John Hersey in his book,

184
00:08:10,029 --> 00:08:11,140
Hiroshima.

185
00:08:11,470 --> 00:08:14,660
It's an account of when the United States dropped an atomic bomb

186
00:08:14,989 --> 00:08:16,820
on the Japanese city

187
00:08:17,070 --> 00:08:17,910
of Hiroshima.

188
00:08:18,730 --> 00:08:19,730
And just to let you know,

189
00:08:19,769 --> 00:08:20,640
if you look at the top,

190
00:08:20,690 --> 00:08:21,660
that first word,

191
00:08:21,690 --> 00:08:23,130
"non-hibakusha."

192
00:08:23,609 --> 00:08:25,320
Hibakusha means

193
00:08:25,529 --> 00:08:28,579
surviving victim of the atomic blast.

194
00:08:30,730 --> 00:08:36,320
What I want you to do here is take out a piece of paper or get a word processor humming,

195
00:08:36,650 --> 00:08:40,000
and I want you to just rewrite this sentence.

196
00:08:40,409 --> 00:08:42,770
Rewrite it exactly as it appears,

197
00:08:43,010 --> 00:08:43,729
word for word,

198
00:08:43,849 --> 00:08:44,859
comma for comma.

199
00:08:46,580 --> 00:08:47,650
Then, when you're finished,

200
00:08:48,219 --> 00:08:50,369
be prepared to talk to somebody about

201
00:08:50,859 --> 00:08:53,250
what you learned about this sentence just by

202
00:08:53,500 --> 00:08:54,500
copying it down.

203
00:08:55,609 --> 00:08:56,070
And in fact,

204
00:08:56,109 --> 00:08:57,460
it may seem crazy to you,

205
00:08:57,510 --> 00:09:00,969
but one of the more effective ways of improving your sentence writing

206
00:09:01,309 --> 00:09:02,580
is to imitate,

207
00:09:02,869 --> 00:09:05,630
to copy what another master writer has done,

208
00:09:05,669 --> 00:09:06,900
and that's what's happening here.

209
00:09:08,419 --> 00:09:10,169
One last note before you do that.

210
00:09:10,460 --> 00:09:13,289
I hope this lesson gave you some enthusiasm

211
00:09:13,659 --> 00:09:16,690
and some willpower to become a sentence artist,

212
00:09:17,179 --> 00:09:18,289
because that's what you are.

213
00:09:18,580 --> 00:09:21,219
You're a writer and writers write sentences.