Name: __________________________________ Date: ____________ PD: 1 2 4 5

Author’s Style
Soon, you will be asked to write the falling action and resolution to Frank Stockton’s “The Lady
or the Tiger?”. But first, there are a few things we must understand about this author’s writing
style.

Style in literature is the literary element that describes the ways that the author uses words — the
author's word choice, sentence structure, figurative language, and sentence arrangement all
work together to establish mood, images, and meaning.

Extended Definition:
A WRITER’S STYLE IS WHAT SETS HIS OR HER WRITING APART and makes it unique. Style is
the way writing is dressed up (or down) to fit the specific context, purpose, or audience. Word
choice, sentence fluency, and the writer’s voice — all contribute to the style of a piece of writing.
How a writer chooses words and structures sentences to achieve a certain effect is also an
element of style. When Thomas Paine wrote “These are the times that try men’s souls,” he
arranged his words to convey a sense of urgency and desperation. Had he written “These are
bad times,” it’s likely he wouldn’t have made such an impact!
Style is usually considered to be the province of literary writers. Novelists such as Ernest
Hemingway and William Faulkner and poets such as Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman are well
known for their distinctive literary styles. But journalists, scientists, historians, and mathematicians
also have distinctive styles, and they need to know how to vary their styles to fit different
audiences. For example, the first-person narrative style of a popular magazine like National
Geographic is quite different from the objective, third-person expository style of a research
journal like Scientific American, even though both are written for informational purposes.

Consider the writing style of Frank Stockton in the short story, “The Lady or the Tiger?” when
reading the following excerpts …

1. “He was a man of exuberant fancy, and, withal, of an authority so irresistible that, at his will, he
turned his varied fancies into facts.”

2. “When a subject was accused of a crime of sufficient importance to interest the king, public
notice was given that on an appointed day the fate of the accused person would be decided in
the king’s arena, a structure which well deserved it’s name; for, although it’s form and plan were
borrowed from afar, its purpose emanated solely from the brain of this man, who, every
barleycorn a king, knew no tradition which owed more allegiance than pleased his fancy, and
who ingrafted on every adopted form of human thought and action the rich growth of his barbaric
idealism.”
(WHEW! Catch your breath now!)

3. “The moment that the case of the criminal was thus decided, doleful iron bells were clanged,
great wails went up from the hired mourners posted on the outer rim of the arena, and the vast
Name: __________________________________ Date: ____________ PD: 1 2 4 5

audience, with bowed heads and downcast hearts, wended slowly their homeward way,
mourning greatly that one so young and fair, or so old and respected, should have merited so
dire a fate.”

4. “Another door opened beneath the king, and a priest, followed by a band of choristers, and
dancing maidens blowing joyous airs on golden horns and treading an epithalamic measure,
advanced to where the pair stood, side by side, and the wedding was promptly and cheerily
solemnized. Then the gay brass bells rang forth their merry peals, the people shouted glad
hurrahs, and the innocent man, preceded by children strewing flowers on his path, led his bride
to his home.”

5. “This semi-barbaric king had a daughter as blooming as his most florid fancies, and with a soul
as fervent and imperious as his own.”

6. “Think of it, fair reader, not as if the decision of the question depended upon yourself, but upon
that hot-blooded, semi-barbaric princess, her soul at a white heat beneath the combined fires of
despair and jealousy. She had lost him, but who should have him?”

RESPOND: What are three things you notice about Stockton’s writing style? List them below.
1. He uses run-on sentences.
2. He uses good vocabulary.
3. He writes in third person.