William Zinsser

Zinsser, a teacher at the New School and at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, leads readers on a journey through all the places where he has done his writing. His story begins in 1946, with his first job at the New York Herald Tribune, a community of legendary journalists and oddballs. Next comes a period of freelance writing for magazines, which found the writer and his typewriter perched in many unusual locations. He recalls the processes that went into creating the original 1974 edition of his book, On Writing Well, and revising it to keep pace with changes in the language and culture of America. The cast of characters includes Yale presidents, actor Peter Sellers, and the gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson. There is no subject index. Annotation c2009 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).

In addition to exploring the techniques of nonfiction writing, Zinsser discusses sexism in writing, jargon, and psychological writing blocks.

Satire on pop art and on American life in the 1960's.

"Since 1955, Dwike Mitchell and Willie Ruff have been performing, teaching, and sharing jazz with the country and the world. William Zinsser, best-selling author of On Writing Well, follows the duo to China, to the American Midwest, to New York City, and to Venice (where Ruff travels back to the roots of Western music in order to explore jazz's heritage). Zinsser tells how these two men, raised in small towns in the South in the 1930s and 40s, struggled and persevered to become masters of their craft - and how they came to embrace the tradition of jazz as it is handed down from one generation to the next."--BOOK JACKET.

"In American Places, more than two dozen of America's most gifted historians write about their own encounters with historic places, bringing a personal viewpoint to bear on a wide variety of sites, ranging from Monticello to Fenway Park."--BOOK JACKET.

Essays on writing for children by well respected children's authors.