Read the excerpt from on writing by stephen king and answer the question. “when you write a story, you’re telling yourself the story,” [gould] said. “when you rewrite, your main job is taking out all the things that are not the story.” gould said something else that was interesting on the day i turned in my first two pieces: write with the door closed, rewrite with the door open. your stuff starts out being just for you, in other words, but then it goes out. once you know what the story is and get it right—as right as you can, anyway—it belongs to anyone who wants to read it. or criticize it. if you’re very lucky (this is my idea, not john gould’s, but i believe he would have subscribed to the notion), more will want to do the former than the latter.” source: king, stephen. on writing: a memoir of the craft. new york: pocket, 2002. 47. print. what is king’s main purpose in this text? to persuade to instruct to reflect to entertain

The correct answer is B. To instruct

Explanation:

The author's purpose or the purpose of a text refers to the objective or main goal an author has with the text or what he or she expects to be the impact of his or her text in others. In the excerpt presented, written by Stephen King who is one of the most famous American writers, especially in science fiction and horror novels, the explains the process a writer should follow when writing a story, this includes writing the story with the door closed or without sharing it but then share it to others. Additionally, King uses the ideas of Gould another writer to explain the steps and perspective writers should have. This means the content of this text and the author of it aims at explaining other writers the way they should write or the procedures they should follow and therefore the main purpose of this text is to instruct.

what: when quoting a source, use the author’s words verbatim, or word-for-word. this means you shouldn’t change any grammar, punctuation, spelling, etc. put quotations around the words to tell your reader where the quote begins and where it ends.

you also need to acknowledge the author. for example, if using mla format for your research paper, you should have in-text citations with the author’s name and page number listed at the end of each quote.

when: use quotations to provide concrete examples to support your claims. using direct quotations is a great way to build your credibility on the subject. it’s also a good idea to quote your source when the author states things in a powerful way. if you think he or she said it best, then use the exact words to share the ideas.

example: in the short story “a jury of her peers”, mrs. hale compares mrs. wright to her caged bird, saying “she—come to think of it, she was kind of like a bird herself. real sweet and pretty, but kind of timid and—fluttery. how—she—did—change” (glaspell).

paraphrasing

what: paraphrasing differs from quoting because you restate the passage in your own words. since you don’t use the author’s words, you don’t need to use quotation marks. however, you still need to acknowledge the author for his or her ideas.

when paraphrasing a text, you should communicate the full meaning of the text; don’t change the meaning. it can be a condensed version of the text, or it could end up being longer than the source it’s paraphrasing.

when: you use paraphrasing when you take notes, or explain a chart or diagram to someone. paraphrasing highlight the important parts of a larger text. it also allows you to simplify the ideas for your readers.

example:

original: “it was no ordinary thing that called her away–it was probably further from ordinary than anything that had ever happened in dickson county. but what her eye took in was that her kitchen was in no shape for leaving: her bread all ready for mixing, half the flour sifted and half unsifted” (glaspell).

paraphrase: as mrs. hales walks around mrs. wright’s home, she notices that the kitchen is in disarray as if she was in the middle of baking bread (glaspell).