The elements of style PDF book by William Strunk (for Writers)





The book thus covers only a small portion of the field of English style. The experience of its writer has been that once past the essentials, students profit most by individual instruction based on the problems of their own work, and that each instructor has his own body of theory, which he may prefer to that offered by any textbook. The numbers of the sections may be used as references in correcting the manuscript.The writer's colleagues in the Department of English at Cornell University have greatly helped him in the preparation of his manuscript Mr. George McLane Wood has kindly consented to the inclusion under Rule 10 of some material from his Suggestions to Authors.I. Introductory 5II. Elementary Rules of Usage 71. Form the possessive singular of nouns by adding 's. 72. In a series of three or more terms with a single con-junction, use a comma after each term except the last 73. Enclose parenthetic expressions between commas . . 84. Place a comma before a conjunction introducing a coordinate clause 105. Do not join independent clauses by a comma. ... 116. Do not break sentences in two 127. A participial phrase at the beginning of a sentencemust refer to the grammatical subject 13III. Elementary Principles or Composition 158. Make the paragraph the unit of composition: oneparagraph to each topic 159. As a rule, begin each paragraph with a topic sentence;end it in conformity with the beginning 1710. Use the active voice 1911. Put statements in positive form 2112. Use definite, specific, concrete language 2213. Omit needless words 2414. Avoid a succession of loose sentences 2515. Express co-ordinate ideas in similar form 2616. Keep related words together 2817. In summaries, keep to one tense 2918. Place the emphatic words of a sentence at the end . 31IV. A Few Matters OF Form ' 33V. Words and Expressions Commonly Misused. 36VI. Spelling 48VII. Exercises on Chapters II and III 50