Stylish Academic Writing

By: Helen Sword

Narrated by: Virginia Wolf

Elegant data and ideas deserve elegant expression, argues Helen Sword in this lively guide to academic writing. For scholars frustrated with disciplinary conventions, and for specialists who want to write for a larger audience but are unsure where to begin, here are imaginative, practical, witty pointers that show how to make articles and books a pleasure to read - and to write.

Dispelling the myth that you cannot get published without writing wordy, impersonal prose, Sword shows how much journal editors and readers welcome work that avoids excessive jargon and abstraction. Sword's analysis of more than a thousand peer-reviewed articles across a wide range of fields documents a startling gap between how academics typically describe good writing and the turgid prose they regularly produce.

Stylish Academic Writing showcases a range of scholars from the sciences, humanities, and social sciences who write with vividness and panache. Individual chapters take up specific elements of style, such as titles and headings, chapter openings, and structure, and close with examples of transferable techniques that any writer can master.

©2012 Helen Sword (P)2018 Tantor

Timely Writing Advice

Centered and practical academic writing advice that is presented concisely and in a way as to be immediately applied to your work. The narrator's reading is stilted at times and her pronunciation of terms is difficult to follow. I'd recommend the printed copy over the audiobook for this title.

Outstanding!

Harvard professor, Steven Pinker, justifiably claims that academic writing is “horrific.“ And in all of her works, Helen sword helps to solve this horrible problem. This particular book is one of the best and most important books on academic writing and writing in general. It does not present platitudes and abstract advice. Rather, based on innovative research, it gives writers clear and actionable advice that they can readily use to improve their writing.

This is inspirational

This is a solid, inspirational treatment of its topic. The author knows what she is writing about. If academic authors would absorb the contents of this book and incorporate them into their writing then all academic work would be more readable, less prone to creating confusion, more credible, and more likely to attract general readership.

I highly recommend this book.

Helpful book read by a convincing voice

These are very helpful ideas, and shout out to the narrator. She brings this book to life.