Uncover How To Write Like Tolstoy: A Journey Into The Minds Of Our Greatest Writers Compiled By Richard A. Cohen Released As Audio Books
book to check. Enjoyed reading it, especially references to all classics : and who wouldnt like to write like Tolstoy
How to Write Like Tolstoy
A Journey into the Minds of Our Greatest Writers
by Richard Cohen
Random House Publishing Group Random House
Random House
Nonfiction Adult
Pub DateMayArchive DateJul
I was given a Copy of How to Write Like Tolstoy through the publisher and their partnership with Netgalley in exchange for my honest review which is as follows:
Written by a former university professor How to Write Like Tolsoy reminds us that we must begin at the beginning.
Cohen points out that every author must discover the style that best suits the individual author, He also talks about finding out whether your book is told inst, or third person or more rarely second person.
Richard Cohen reminds us to question what makes good fiction, This book talks about many aspects of writing,
I recommend How to Write Like Tolstoy to authors and aspiring Authors,
Five out of five
Happy Reading, . . OK, I have no hopes or aspirations to write like Tolstoy, but taking a journey into the minds of our greatest writers count me in.
Richard Cohen provides the reader with so many fascinating examples of what makes our most famous writers tick you're bound to come across something, about one of your favorite writers, that you weren't aware of.
And will say to yourself, "Awesome", I know I did, A very worthwhile book for writers, Cohen combines writing advice with literary history, with loads of examples from classic as well as more modern books, As a longtime editor he offers insider insights drawn from personal knowledge and author interactions, If you're a writer or want to be, read this book, Love this book! I think the author did a really good job of providing new ideas to improve your writing.
I have read a lot of writing books and sadly they tend to be really repetitive, This book was a breath of fresh air! Also this author seems really cool, I loved his book on fencing as well, Rocketing up the charts to take SECOND PLACE in my all time favourite books about the love of literature.
My favourite remains sitelinkReading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them.
Both books share something beautiful: a shining love of reading, writing, and literature, An infectious love which spills into your heart, and a friendly style, so that you feel all at once as if the author is your new best friend, and you suddenly love everything that they love.
Francise Prose made me love Chekhov Richard Cohen might've persuaded me to give Philip Roth another try, and I've been meaning to get round to Colette for ages.
These two books should be read together, Francine Prose takes you via the front door of literature, lovingly displaying the finished art: perfectly structured sentences, paragraphs, chapters.
Richard Cohen takes you through the back door, and shows you the kitchen and the authors sweating away at their work: the troubles of writing sex scenes, when and how to plagiarise, what's a great opening, the difficulty of finishing, and rewriting, rewriting, rewriting.
This book is absolutely stuffed to the gills with quotes and references it feels like a cosy gossip about people who you desperately admire and have always wanted to be friends with: how Hemmingway wrote standing up, apparently how authors feel about plot E.
M. Forster passionately in favour Stephen King passionately against what authors are like to edit Fay Weldon apparently wonderfully willing to take criticism it's not in the book but an anecdote that I heard about Diana Wynne Jones was that her editor would tell her that certain sections needed to be changed, Wynne Jones would dutifully cut out the offending parts and then paste them all back in exactly the same place, and the editor would say it was much improved and
accept it!
If you love books and books about books then definitely read this one! Great tips and advice from some of our best writers.
Cohen uses a wide range of authors and genres, Goes from ideas, good beginnings and endings, and revisions, Readable, not too scholarly. Great personal stories of the writers, Very enjoyable. Must read for aspiring writers, but the name of the book should be 'Whatever floats your boat, man!' Despite the How To title this is not really a writing guide per se so much as a collection of anecdotes, quotations, and sample passages illustrating the often contradictory techniques of highlyregarded fiction writers, with some thin connective tissue courtesy of author Cohen.
Who should not be confusedas I learned the hard way when I Googled himwith Washington Post columnist and noted sex pest/racist sitelinkRichard Cohen, nor conversion therapy advocate sitelinkRichard A.
Cohen, though GR seems to have conflated him with the latter, Inevitable chapters on characterization, POV, dialogue, etc, but also more novel stuff like irony, avoiding plagiarism, and writing effective sex scenes,
I could've done with a bit less namedropping and accomplishmentflagging by Cohen, evidently a lifelong publishing industry type this is the sort of book where a oneline quotation by Norman Mailer will be prefaced with a totally extraneous paragraph about how Cohen used to do passes on Mailer's manuscripts.
For that matter, it's also the type of bookpublished inwhere a glance at the index reveals at least nine intext references to Mailer andto John Updike but not a single mention of James Baldwin.
Interestingly I can't find any indication that Cohen himself has ever published any fiction, despite having copyedited quite a bit of it, which makes him an odd fit for a book like this.
Not a phenomenon unique to him, of course, but always a curious one, Then again, as mentioned before, his main role here is as a compiler, not an instructor,
If you've read much about writers and writing it's unlikely anything here will blow your mind, but I knew what I was in for and my expectations were largely met.
I'm a sucker for craft talk and authorial anecdotes, and I find this sort of thing helpful in restoking excitement for my own literary projects.
Beyond that, I can't imagine it will linger in my mind very long,
Though actually Baldwin does appear once, in a footnote alongside several other authors whom Cohen assures us write good gay sex.
Questions about what one's dream career is are one of the gateways to more stimulating conversations and my usual answer is being a prog rock guitar virtuoso like John Petrucci even though playing drums or keyboards would be more fun but less cool.
When pressed for a honest answer as my often hypothetical conversation partners are wont to do I change to a writerslashwhisky bar owner/bartender think LampB whisky cafe in Amsterdam, which I can't advertise enough.
The issue with being a writer is paraphrasing Douglas Adams that you have to write something, and I struggle with discipline.
Fortunately, once in a blue moon, something usually a book comes around that manages to convince me, before I've started reading it that there is a different catch, something I can overcome way more easily, and finally, after reading it, I'll be able to embark on a career I was meant to do.
Mind you, nowhere does the book actually say so apart from in my head, but still, How To Write Like Tolstoy was the latest of its kind,
Richard Cohen is a seasoned editor and thus knows a thing or two about what works in fiction.
His book touches on many aspects of writing opening, dialogue, sex scenes etc etc and offers plethora of advice and examples on how to tackle them.
Reading it can be very good for your inner literary snob, who will keep score on how many of the examples you've been aware of/read.
Actual advice tends to be less frequent than the actual advice, but that's perhaps to be expected as none of these are hard rules.
One thing I really liked were examples of before/after writing from famous works of literature, showing how craftful editing whoever it is that performs it can add focus, change the angle or stress an aspect of a scene to no end.
On the lighthearted note, I appreciated a mention of the Bad Sex in Fiction award in the appropriate chapter, but missed any mention of The Bulwer Lytton Fiction contest for the worst opening sentence despite the person that gave it name and its original entry makes an appearance.
Will this book turn you into a writer No, for that you'll have to write stuff, not just read it.
Will it make you write more Also no, and I wonder whether there is a thing with that power out there apart from assault weapons and/or upcoming deadlines.
Why should you read it then Apart from the inherent entertainment value, it might help you with those pesky details that you just can't seem to get right.
As well as to give you hope since many if not most of the literary diamonds might have very well started as less than lumps of coal that got transformed with time and effort.
I received a galley copy of this book for review, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, While the book is more about how great literature is written rather than teaching a novice to write, a chief way for anyone to begin to learn the craft to by reading great writers.
Cohen has experience as a long time editor and is well versed in classic and contemporary literature, I was surprised and disappointed when I finished this book because I wanted more, This text could be considered for background reading with graduate work, .