# Western writers widely recognized as master stylists **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** books-writing-myths\ **Created:** [May 3, 2024, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117 "2024-05-03T22:17:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Caribbean\_cruiser](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/caribbean_cruiser/32/9349_2.png) [@Caribbean\_cruiser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caribbean_cruiser)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2024, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/1 "2024-05-03T22:17:06Z")
Now that I am traveling more and have more time to read, I’d like to sample some fine writing. From the outset, I’ll concede “great writing” is highly subjective. I’m not interested right now in reading works by best-selling _storytellers_ like Stephen King, Nora Roberts, Grisham, Baldacci, but instead prefer works are beautifully written or have artful wordplay or just exhibit a great deal of artistry. I mean writers whose mastery makes people exclaim, “Wow, this is a great writer.” I’m open to old classics that are really great reads, not just because they’re on a lot of must-read lists. My apologies if I haven’t expressed myself clearly enough, but I think most of you get what I’m saying. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2024, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/2 "2024-05-03T22:31:11Z")
You have your James Joyce, Thomas Pynchon, Vladimir Nabokov, William Shakespeare… ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2024, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/3 "2024-05-03T23:43:55Z")
My favorite SF writer is Ursula Le Guin. She’s not the best worldbuilder (though she’s quite good), she’s not trying to be a technological or sociopolitical seer, or any of the stuff you get from more conventional authors in the genre. What she is, is a phenomenal _writer,_ in the sense that every one of her sentences is just a perfectly polished gem. The ideas she’s expressing and the philosophical questions she’s exploring are interesting and provocative and compelling to be sure, but even aside from that, her work is genuinely a pleasure to read simply for the craft of it. ---
**Author:** ![FlikTheBlue](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fliktheblue/32/10972_2.png) [@FlikTheBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlikTheBlue)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/4 "2024-05-04T01:16:01Z")
I recommend Catherynne M. Valente. Her stories are exactly what you describe if I take your meaning correctly. > **[Catherynne M. Valente](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherynne_M._Valente)** > > Catherynne Morgan Valente (born May 5, 1979) is an American fiction writer, poet, and literary critic. For her speculative fiction novels she has won the annual James Tiptree, Andre Norton, and Mythopoeic Fantasy awards. Her short fiction has appeared in Clarkesworld Magazine, the anthologies Salon Fantastique and Paper Cities, along with numerous "Year's Best" volumes. Her critical work has appeared in the International Journal of the Humanities as well as in numerous essay collections. > Valen... I haven’t read all her works, but of those I have, _Palimpsest_ and _Comfort me With Apples_ are both beautifully written. If you prefer short stories, _The Future is Blue_ is an excellent collection. ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/5 "2024-05-04T01:24:25Z")
Charles Bukowski ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/6 "2024-05-04T01:29:55Z")
James Baldwin ---
**Author:** ![dpbanana](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6a8cbe/32.png) [@dpbanana](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dpbanana)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/7 "2024-05-04T01:32:07Z")
Shakespeare would certainly say he told stories:) Telling stories well is an essential part of great writing. Agree with Pynchon, and James Joyce, and I’ll add Toni Morrison, Gustave Flaubert (_Madame Bovary_), Anton Chekhov (short stories), Franz Kafka, William Faulkner, Melville, George Eliot, Ernest Hemingway, Jane Austen, Kurt Vonnegut, Flannery O’Connor, Virginia Woolf, Truman Capote, Charles Dickens, and Raymond Carver. In SF, Ray Bradbury and Gene Wolfe are known for their writing styles. I could go on, but I’ll leave it at these. Stephen King, by the way, is a highly skilled writer. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/8 "2024-05-04T09:46:23Z")
PG Wodehouse ---
**Author:** ![dirtball](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dirtball/32/18772_2.png) [@dirtball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dirtball)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/9 "2024-05-04T13:02:54Z")
> [@dpbanana](#): > > Ray Bradbury Bradbury was the first one I thought of. I do think he overdid the whole “stylistic writing thing” just a bit on occasion, but overall, a very solid choice. I’ll add Richard Brautigan. I reread his books every so often because they’re so incredibly distinctive in style and just flat-out quirky in pretty much every conceivable way. There are times when I desperately wish he’d had a copyeditor (or maybe a better one), and maybe there’s a “cringe moment” here and there, but on the whole, good stuff if you’re a bit adventurous. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/10 "2024-05-04T13:16:15Z")
Dave Barry Comedy is very tough to convey in writing, one mis-step and it ain’t funny, folks. Dave is a master at funny. That being said, his column about seeing his dying father one last time was simply beautiful. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Bravo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_bravo/32/493_2.png) [@Johnny\_Bravo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Bravo)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/11 "2024-05-04T13:20:44Z")
EB White’s collected essays are masterpieces. The guy literally wrote the book on style ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/12 "2024-05-04T13:23:05Z")
When I re-read _Charlotte’s Web_ as an adult, it struck me how well-written it is. ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/13 "2024-05-04T13:39:39Z")
For beautiful non-fiction prose its hard to do better than Loren Eiseley or John McPhee. One oldie that remains a fave because of the quality of its writing and sense of wonderment, which McPhee and Eiseley also share is Darwin’s Voyage of the Beagle. I think knowing the consequences of the voyage to Darwin’s ideas only makes it an even better read. ---
**Author:** ![Caribbean\_cruiser](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/caribbean_cruiser/32/9349_2.png) [@Caribbean\_cruiser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caribbean_cruiser)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/14 "2024-05-04T13:39:50Z")
> [@dpbanana](#): > > Shakespeare would certainly say he told stories:) Telling stories well is an essential part of great writing. Agree with Pynchon, and James Joyce, and I’ll add Toni Morrison, Gustave Flaubert (_Madame Bovary_), Anton Chekhov (short stories), Franz Kafka, William Faulkner, Melville, George Eliot, Ernest Hemingway, Jane Austen, Kurt Vonnegut, Flannery O’Connor, Virginia Woolf, Truman Capote, Charles Dickens, and Raymond Carver. In SF, Ray Bradbury and Gene Wolfe are known for their writing styles. I could go on, but I’ll leave it at these. Stephen King, by the way, is a highly skilled writer. Shakespeare was a fabulous storyteller and a brilliant literary stylist. And that’s my question: Who scores high on both? Jane Austen’s opening lines in Pride and Prejudice were indeed artfully penned. I like the incusion of Faulkner, O’Connor, and Woolf. I would add Fitzgerald. ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/15 "2024-05-04T14:06:53Z")
Cormac McCarthy would be a contemporary choice. Like him or not, he definitely has a distinctive writing style that’s all his own. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/16 "2024-05-04T14:44:19Z")
Agreed. Also Larry McMurtry and Nathaniel Philbrick. I’ve also read all of Kate Atkinson’s books. She has a very sly sense of humor; I highly recommend her Jackson Brodie series. Oh, and Bill Bryson for humorous non-fiction. I see that I kinda missed the “master stylist” condition. Ah well, the above are good books, nonetheless. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/17 "2024-05-04T17:09:15Z")
The nature writer and philosopher Robert MacFarlane - try _Holloway_ or _The Old Ways_ ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/18 "2024-05-04T17:29:54Z")
> [@PatrickLondon](#): > > PG Wodehouse I was coming in to say that. Here’s what Robertson Davies had to say about Wodehouse in an article in the Washington Post: > [@](#): > > Wodehouse was first and foremost a consummate stylist, and his wit and invention, though remarkable, are secondary in any critical consideration to that one overmastering quality. > > What are the characteristics of this remarkable style? First, economy, for though it appears opulent and gentle in pace, there is not a word too many, and the stories move at remarkable speed. Next, it is a flattering style, for in spite of the author’s apparent anti-intellectual bias, he treats his readers to gleanings from a remarkable variety of classical writers, philosophers and poets, and does it so skillfully that we are left with a feeling of being cleverer and better-read than we thought we were. He is at his most subtle, perhaps, in what we may call the Buried Quotation, which he uses either as part of the speech of one of his characters (as often as not that pantry-Rochefoucauld, Reginald Jeeves) or in his own voice as author. His plots are ingenious and finely- wrought, and the fact that they are improbable is not important, for the Wodehouse world is not bound by common laws. Lastly, he has a faultless ear for cadence and nuance, and employs a very large vocabulary in such a way that the reader becomes convinced it is his own. > > Like Ben Jonson, Wodehouse has a relish for jargon, and the specialized lingoes of thieves, stockbrokers and kindred underworld types. He can drop a cant term into a sentence which is otherwise of Addisonesque purity, and produce a comic effect no other writer can approach. Understandably this fineness of taste and ear has brought him legions of admirers, some of whom have expressed themselves intemperately. It was silly of Hilaire Belloc to hail Wodehouse as the leader of the literary world of his day. It was sillier still of A. J. P. Taylor to rank him with Congreve. But when Evelyn Waugh referred to him as The Master, he spoke truly, for Waugh learned much from Wodehouse, and went on to write important novels in a style wholly his own, but in which the Wodehouse influence is observable. > **[The Jovial World of Pelham Grenville Wodehouse](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/entertainment/books/1981/11/29/the-jovial-world-of-pelham-grenville-wodehouse/4adf162e-e84e-4fe3-970b-735780070a10/)** ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/19 "2024-05-04T17:31:45Z")
Guy Gavriel Kay, an incredibly wonderful fantasy/alternative history author. But _do not_ start with the Fionavar trilogy. Many of his novels are set in a parallel Europe and Mediterranean civilization; for those, start with _Sailing to Sarantium_, then _Lord of Emperors_. There are others set in that world as well. He’s set two novels in an ancient China analog, starting with _Under Heaven_ and followed as a semi sequel by _River of Stars_. It’s no coincidence that he’s also published a book of poetry. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2024, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117/20 "2024-05-04T17:55:43Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > Robertson Davies He’s not too bad himself. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/western-writers-widely-recognized-as-master-stylists/1001117.md?page=2)