While this is a writing text for college composition courses, I hope it also provides many useful suggestions for writing in general. I have tried to direct all topics towards actual writing for a real audience or readership. Several of the short exercises may help a student practice specific skills or principles that he or she can then apply in writing real essays, reports, sketches, and letters.

At the same time, the material in the chapters of this text is written and presented for an audience of college students. Use of this book in the classroom has confirmed that the material is at the appropriate level, not too basic and not too difficult for a college-level writing course.

For the reading selections by other authors, I have picked works that are no longer under copyright, so that I would not have to deal with reprint permissions. I have consciously selected passages that are thought-provoking and that might help some readers broaden their vocabulary if they wished to do so. Also, I have drawn from predominantly well-known, time-honored works, in the hopes that I might encourage some interest in reading good books from the past.