Book: Good Prose by Tracy Kidder and Richard Todd

The Art of Nonfiction ~ Stories and advice from a lifetime of writing and editing.

Todd has been Kidder's editor for a long time and here they collaborate on the relationship between editor and writer, especially their own, and, yes, tell "stories" and give "advice" on how to write better. There are chapters, for instance, that discuss Narratives, Essays or The Problem of Style. The last chapter, Notes on Usage, includes one of my personal irritations: the ubiquitous use of "grow" as in the economy. The authors admit this a prejudice they share, so I'm in good company. 

Todd is the fatherly soothing guiding one; Kidder is the kid even though they are only five years apart in age. Or at least it began that way. They are mutually complimentary, and the respect and fondness they have for one another is refreshing. 

There are examples of good and bad writing, along with the processes Kidder and Todd use as they work together. It is often interesting enough...these glimpses into a writer's life and how a good editor is a skilled literary midwife. It is a book that is best read quickly, not at the pace of a few pages at a time. 

Of Katherine Boo's book The Beautiful Forevers, Kidder writes that "This is difficult material transformed by story, by Boo's skill in making those unfortunate people real--people with hopes and plans and flaws and virtues, all looking for ways to improve their lives, people at bottom not all that different from anyone else, people the reader roots for and occasionally against. One hardly notices while reading their stories that the author is also supplying some of the sociopolitical context in which the stories occur, not a sanitized but a distilled context, to slightly insinuated that we feel we understand the forces that afflict these people." 

Todd says that "Over the years people have sometimes asked me what it 'takes' to be a writer....[and] the answer is that is seems to take an inability to imagine yourself doing anything else, because anything else is so much easier. It would have been impossible to discourage Kidder, and heartless to try." 

If you like Tracy Kidder's books and are curious about the intersection of editor and author, you would probably like Good Prose.