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How to make sense
***How to Make Sense*** First page is signed with date 1954 but am not sure if it's Rudolf Flescher's.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1954
48 people want to read
About the author
Rudolf Flesch
31 books31 followersFrom Wikipedia,
Rudolf Flesch (8 May 1911 – 5 October 1986) was an author, readability expert, and writing consultant who was an early and vigorous proponent of plain English in the United States. He created the Flesch Reading Ease test and was co-creator of the Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test. He was raised in Austria and finished university there, studying law. He then moved to the United States and entered a graduate program at Columbia University, where he earned a Ph.D in English.
Flesch was born in Vienna, Austria. He fled to the United States to avoid the imminent invasion of the Nazis, to avoid Jewish prosecution. Once in America, he met Elizabeth Terpenning, whom he married. They had six children: Anne, Hugo, Jillian, Katrina, Abigal, and Janet. Flesch lived the majority of his life with his wife and children in Dobbs Ferry, New York, a small village in southern Westchester county.
[edit] Professional Information
Not long after finishing his degree, he wrote what became his most famous book, Why Johnny Can't Read, in 1955. The book was a focused critique of the then-trendy movement to teach reading by sight, often called the "look-say" method. The flaw of this approach, according to Flesch, was that it required learners to memorize words by sight. When confronted with an unknown word, the learner was stumped. Flesch advocated a return to phonics, the teaching of reading by teaching learners to sound out words.
Flesch flourished as a writing teacher, plain-English consultant, and author. He wrote many books on the subject of clear, effective communication: How to Test Readability (1951), How to Write Better (1951), The Art of Plain Talk (1946), The Art of Readable Writing (1949), The ABC of Style: A Guide to Plain English (1964), and Rudolf Flesch on Business Communications: How to Say What You Mean in Plain English (1972).
Flesch produced three other books of note:
In The Art of Clear Thinking (1951), Flesch consolidates research data and then-recent findings from the fields of psychology and education, and suggests how his readers can apply that information in their daily life. As he writes in his introduction, "It would be impudent to tell intelligent, grown up people how to think. All I have tried to do here is to assemble certain known facts about the human mind and put them in plain English."
In Lite English (1983), Flesch advocated the use of many colloquial and informal words. The subtitle of the book reveals his bias: Popular Words That Are OK to Use No Matter What William Safire, John Simon, Edwin Newman, and the Other Purists Say!
And in 1979, Flesch published a book he had produced while working as a communication and writing consultant to the Federal Communications Commission: How to Write Plain English: A Book for Lawyers and Consumers. This book was and is a "how to" for writing rules and regulations that must be read and understood by the general public.
Rudolf Flesch (8 May 1911 – 5 October 1986) was an author, readability expert, and writing consultant who was an early and vigorous proponent of plain English in the United States. He created the Flesch Reading Ease test and was co-creator of the Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test. He was raised in Austria and finished university there, studying law. He then moved to the United States and entered a graduate program at Columbia University, where he earned a Ph.D in English.
Flesch was born in Vienna, Austria. He fled to the United States to avoid the imminent invasion of the Nazis, to avoid Jewish prosecution. Once in America, he met Elizabeth Terpenning, whom he married. They had six children: Anne, Hugo, Jillian, Katrina, Abigal, and Janet. Flesch lived the majority of his life with his wife and children in Dobbs Ferry, New York, a small village in southern Westchester county.
[edit] Professional Information
Not long after finishing his degree, he wrote what became his most famous book, Why Johnny Can't Read, in 1955. The book was a focused critique of the then-trendy movement to teach reading by sight, often called the "look-say" method. The flaw of this approach, according to Flesch, was that it required learners to memorize words by sight. When confronted with an unknown word, the learner was stumped. Flesch advocated a return to phonics, the teaching of reading by teaching learners to sound out words.
Flesch flourished as a writing teacher, plain-English consultant, and author. He wrote many books on the subject of clear, effective communication: How to Test Readability (1951), How to Write Better (1951), The Art of Plain Talk (1946), The Art of Readable Writing (1949), The ABC of Style: A Guide to Plain English (1964), and Rudolf Flesch on Business Communications: How to Say What You Mean in Plain English (1972).
Flesch produced three other books of note:
In The Art of Clear Thinking (1951), Flesch consolidates research data and then-recent findings from the fields of psychology and education, and suggests how his readers can apply that information in their daily life. As he writes in his introduction, "It would be impudent to tell intelligent, grown up people how to think. All I have tried to do here is to assemble certain known facts about the human mind and put them in plain English."
In Lite English (1983), Flesch advocated the use of many colloquial and informal words. The subtitle of the book reveals his bias: Popular Words That Are OK to Use No Matter What William Safire, John Simon, Edwin Newman, and the Other Purists Say!
And in 1979, Flesch published a book he had produced while working as a communication and writing consultant to the Federal Communications Commission: How to Write Plain English: A Book for Lawyers and Consumers. This book was and is a "how to" for writing rules and regulations that must be read and understood by the general public.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
October 6, 2011
One of the most amazing books I've ever read. It covers ideas about how to communicate clearly, based on how people actually think, feel and relate. Not like any other manual of style you've ever read, because it has depth and substance, not rules.
I first read this about thirty years ago, and I still punctuate my writing based on the discussion of dashes, commas, semi-colons, colons and periods as units expressing the amount of time passing. And I'll never forget the reflections on how meaningless it is to have read a book, just as it would be meaningless to have listened to a piece of music.
I first read this about thirty years ago, and I still punctuate my writing based on the discussion of dashes, commas, semi-colons, colons and periods as units expressing the amount of time passing. And I'll never forget the reflections on how meaningless it is to have read a book, just as it would be meaningless to have listened to a piece of music.
September 6, 2011
I bought this book on a lark and I found it very entertaining and insightful. The book title does not accurately describe the book. Flesch does not seek to teach you how to speak better, but this is really a book of essays on English grammar. Very well-written, and entertaining. I found his discussion on why vocabulary building really doesn't help you at all. Poetry and punctuation talks about how punctuation used to be done. An entertaining and light-hearted re-red of the essays I've indicated.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews