Wall Street Journal
"The most immediate pleasure of this book is that it heightens one's appreciation of the craft of great writers and speakers. Mr. Farnsworth includes numerous examples from Shakespeare and Dickens, Thoreau and Emerson, Winston Churchill and Abraham Lincoln. He also seems keen to rehabilitate writers and speakers whose rhetorical artistry is undervalued; besides his liking for Chesterton, he shows deep admiration for the Irish statesman Henry Grattan (1746-1820), whose studied repetition of a word ("No lawyer can say so; because no lawyer could say so without forfeiting his character as a lawyer") is an instance, we are told, of conduplicatio. But more than anything Mr. Farnsworth wants to restore the reputation of rhetorical artistry per se, and the result is a handsome work of reference."
--(Henry Hitchings)
Bryan A. Garner
"I must refrain from shouting what a brilliant work this is (paeteritio). Farnsworth has written the book as he ought to have written it – and as only he could have written it (symploce). It is copious and erudite and well-documented (polysyndeton). Buy it and read it – buy it and read it (epimone)."
--(Bryan A. Garner, author of The Elements of Legal Style)
Erin McKean
"Every writer should have this book."
--(Erin McKean, editor of Verbatim: The Language Quarterly and CEO of wordnik.com)
Library Journal
An engaging and accessible guide, valuable to all who wish to improve their rhetorical skills or better appreciate the abilities of others.
Carlin Romano
So, dear reader, I say it even if I say it myself—get this book! No, really, get this book! Read clever Farnsworth, and read him again, and you may become more clever yourself.
—Carlin Romano, The Chronicle of Higher Education
Victor Davis Hanson
"Ward Farnsworth's invaluable review of classical English rhetoric is not only a vital tool for aiding clear expression, but a timely reminder that, despite the confusion of the present technological age, human nature, and our ability to communicate in clear and often beautiful ways, are unchanging."
--(Victor Davis Hanson, co-author of Who Killed Homer?: The Demise of Classical Education and the Recovery of Greek Wisdom)
