On writting Well-Chapter11&12

Ⅰ、vocabulary

1、preponderance

意思： N-SING 单数名词 （数量上的）优势，大多数，主体 If there is a preponderance of one type of person or thing in a group, there is more of that type than of any other.

原文： But in fact the great preponderance of what writers nowwrite and sell.

造句： The preponderance of evidence suggests that he's guilty.

2、predominately/predominatly

意思： ADV-GRADED 副词 最显著地；占主导地位地 You use predominantly to indicate which feature or quality is most noticeable in a situation.

原文： Since 1946the Book-ofthe-Month Club's members have predominantly demanded—and therefore received—nonfiction.

造句： His audience consists predominantly of groups of rugby-club revellers.

3、cajole

意思： VERB 动词 哄骗;劝诱;说服 If you cajole someone into doing something, you get them to do it after persuading them for some time.

原文： He is finally saying all thethings you have been trying to cajole out of him for an hour, andsaying them with what seems to be Churchillian eloquence

造句： He cajoled me into agreeing to do the work.

Ⅱ、Reflection

That, finally, is my standard. I know that it's just not possibleto write a competent interview without some juggling and eliding of quotes; don't believe anywriter who claims he never doesit. But many shades of opinion exist on both sides of mine.Purists would say that Joseph Mitchell has taken a novelist's wand to the facts. Progressives would say that Mitchell was apioneer—that he anticipated by several decades the "new journalism" that writers like Gay Talese and Tom Wolfe were hailedfor inventing in the 1960s, using fictional techniques of imagined dialogue and emotion to give narrative flair to works whosefacts they had punctiliously researched. Both views are partlyright.

What's wrong, I believe, is to fabricate quotes or to surmisewhat someone might have said. Writing is a public trust. Thenonfiction writer s rare privilege is to have the whole wonderfulworld of real people to write about. When you get people talking, handle what they sayas you would handle a valuable gift.

读完想就非虚构类作品中作者的技法问题说说自己的看法。我是很赞成Mitchell的做法的，虽然作品归为非虚构，要求也是对事实的真实描述，但并不意味着完全依着事实写。很多情况下，非虚构类作者可以用文学化的手法来稍微修改、调整一些实际情况，否则，作品的文学性就会大大降低。但中并不意味着扭曲事实。非虚构类作家必须具有一定的公众责任感，因而在用笔展现事实时，必应以原来情况为基础。笔端的文字在作家的润色下完全有必要放大真正重要的东西，比如某个人可贵的品质、过于繁琐口语中的要点等，这其实也是非虚构类作家社会责任感的一种表现。