Style and Tone
Style and Tone are important to identify in a passage. Their identification helps in better understanding of the passage and also helps in solving related questions. Students often get confused between style and tone of a passage. Let us try and understand the difference.
Style
Of a passage is the way an author presents his thoughts or what mode/kind of writing does he use to convey his ideas. It can be descriptive, narrative, data driven etc. The style remains same throughout the passage. In simple words, style tells us ‘how’ a passage has been written. Following are two passages with different styles.
Passage-1
Last year I won $18,200 in cash and $800 in prize as a contestant on a now-defunct CBS-TV game show called “Now You See It.” I was a “good” contestant: tearful, swooning and avarice-driven. But now, 15 months later, I have flunked out as a bookkeeper. I can’t figure what happened to the winnings I eked out during eight shows, the bulk of which came when I answered this esoteric question: “ Who was Popeye’s hamburger-eating friend?” All know for sure is that it’s gone, and I’m back to living pay check to pay check. That’s why; it seems to me, the show would have been more aptly named. “Now You See It… Now You Don’t “- since the mullah that came my way has vanished much like magicians’ rabbits.
Hard though I’ve tried, I can’t unravel the mystery of my missing loot. Not most of it, anyway. Uncle Sam, of curse, got his share: $4,200. Then I paid off my car and helped my mother get two new caps for her front teeth (at least she’s got something to smile about). I also treated myself to an $850 typewriter and a weekend in Las Vegas. But once you subtract these sums that still leave $11,000 to account for.
Oh yes, there was that self-indulgent clothes-buying spree I went on one weekend-there went another $600- and the time I took my mother on her first outing to Disneyland (we stayed two nights in a nearby hotel). And I visited Palm Springs, purchased a wall hanging for my living room and signed on an answering service. Come to think of it, everything’s starting to add up. As I leaf through my tell-late check book, my trail of spending gets warmer: $50 for an aquarium and $85 for dermatology. Also, for the first time, I dined out a lot without fear of bank overdrawals. In fact, I’ve never been more relaxed about spending money than during those halcyon days.
Still, just where did all the rest go? Well, I took a karate course and learned just enough to antagonize anyone who might attack me. I moved into a more expensive apartment- but not that much more expensive. I hired a cleaning lady who comes in twice a month and is now indispensable.
I had my couch recovered (aha! $450), bought two new living-room chairs (aha again! $550), plus a lamp and a bookshelf. These were fairly major expenses, but now, on closer thought, I recall incurring a good many smaller outlays- high –style haircuts, for instance, and porcelain fingernails- all of which helped nickel-and –dime my little fortune a away. What else? I gave three or four good-sized dinner parties. I probably spent $400 on books. I also bought a ficus benjamina for my apartment. Okay, but that still leaves me with $8,000.
Oh yes, did I mention the aquarium? What I didn’t mention was that I stocked it with three. Siamese fighting fish, at $2.99 each. Nor did I skimp on gifts for friends and relatives. As an example, my mother got a new colour TV set. No, hold on … the TV set doesn’t count: I purchased it after the game show money went- well, wherever it went. Is there a black hole in space somewhere that sucks up money like stardust?
Come back to earth, baby. On my mother’s birthday, didn’t I take her to a surprise party for eight at one of her favourite restaurants? Another time, I rented a limousine for the evening to pick up my date, and it transported us to one of the 100 or so movies, plays and operas that I attended during this protracted spree. But perhaps my greatest extravagance was sending Christmas cards to all my cat’s animal friends.
I must also confess that, when it came to working last year, I didn’t exactly knock myself out at the typewriter. Actually, I took off about four months, if you add up all the time between magazine- writing assignments. Unfortunately, day-to-day living expenses do add up, so when all is said and done, the mystery isn’t so mysterious any more. Maybe you’ll criticize me for not having invested the $14,000 I had left after taxes. Well, I did look for a house (God, how I looked!) but I couldn’t find anything in my price range that was even the size of my apartment. My doctor recommended Puerto Rican telephone bonds at 6% (tax free), and my mother kept plugging for the security of a savings and loan deposit. But instead of doing any of those things, I spent the money, pure and simple. After all, I hadn’t exactly broken my back earning it, or even wracked my brain- “ Wimpy” simply leaped out from my memory bank.
Naming Popeye’s hamburger-eating friend was a pushover, actually, for anyone who has spent time in England: there is “ Wimpy burger “ stands all over London. So thanks, Popeye, Wimpy, Olive Oyl and all the old gang. It was great while it lasted, and so what if I can’t dip into my savings to pay the rent? Come to think of it, maybe I can help make ends meet by selling an article somewhere about Carly the Big Spender …
Style:
The author has used first person narration. Hence the style is Narrative.
Passage 2
Despite general scepticism about cures for the common cold, millions of dollars worth of commercial remedies is still sold in this country every year. Old-fashioned cures like asafoetida and camphor are no longer in vogue, but in their place come a whole new arsenal of popular remedies – vitamins, vaccines, nasal medications and other drugs. Yet careful investigation shows that many of the most widely advertised remedies now on the market are utterly worthless. Some of them, in fact, may be definitely harmful.
In an effort to discover an effective cold remedy, a series of investigations was begun ten years ago at the University of Minnesota. The studies grew out of a chance observation, which had led me to believe that morphine might be of value in reliving acute head colds. Extensive, tests corroborated this observation; but morphine, because of its toxicity and the danger of habituation to it, was obviously unsuited for general use. The scope of the investigation was consequently broadened in the hope of finding a remedy that would be equally effective but less harmful. In this way, many of the most widely used cold preparations came under close study.
The investigations were carried out by the Students’ Health Service of the University. Each study was specifically planned to avoid prejudice for or against any particular medication. Physicians wrote prescriptions merely for “cold medication,” The pharmacist filling them used in sequence the medications being studied at the time. Neither physicians nor patient knew what medication had been given. After forty-eight hours of treatment, the patients reported the results on cards prepared for this purpose. Upon the basis of these reports the effectiveness of the medication in each case was estimated. Finally, the pharmacist’s record was estimated. Finally, the pharmacists’ record obtained and the results tabulated according to the various medications used.
In each of these studies some of the tablets and capsules given out contained only milk sugar. These were included so that we might know what proportion of patients would recover without treatment in the forty-eight-hour period for which results were reported. In other words, the group who received sugar tablets, thinking that they contained medication, served as a “control group for the rest of the study. The importance of having this control was clearly shown in the very first investigations. Approximately 35 percent of the students who got the sugar tablets reported “definite improvement” or “complete cure” of their colds within forty-eight hours.
Some of them experienced such prompt and remarkable improvement; in fact, that they went out of their way to praise the tablets as the most effective treatments they had ever taken. Apart from the humour of the situation, this control group showed that approximately 35 percent of patients would have recovered quickly regardless of any medication. For the purposes of our studies, therefore, we put down as of little or no value all cold medications from which less than 50 percent of our subjects reported benefit. Virtually all of the most commonly used medications proved, on this basis, to be almost valueless. This group of remedies included aspirin, calcium and iodine, halibut liver oil (which is vitamin A). amatol, ephedrine, atropine, an aspirin-phenacetincaffeine compound (which is sold under various names) and soda. Although aspirin ranks at the top of this group, the results from it are very little better than from the sugar tablets. This is true regardless of the brand of aspirin used, “genuine” or otherwise. Even less valuable were the results obtained from soda, another widely recommended cold remedy, and Advertisers have emphasized the importance of “alkalisation” in the treatment of colds. In this study we gave sufficient dosages of soda to produce much more alkalisation than is possible from any of the commercial preparations sold in drug stores. Yet the results of this alkalisation were exactly the same as those reported from the sugar tablets.
Perhaps the most commonly used of all cold remedies are the preparations to be dropped or sprayed into the nose. In our studies we selected the most extensively advertised and widely sold brand of “nose drops.” It was transferred to unlabeled bottles, and then dispensed to the students with the directions given by the manufacturer. Only 31 percent reported benefit from it, about the same as those who used sugar tablets. Nasal preparations not only have little value, but may do harm by interfering with the body’s natural defences. Medical research has shown that the common cold is usually initiated by a virus or respiratory tract. A primary state of infection follows, whose symptoms are stuffiness of the nose, sneezing, watery nasal discharge, dryness of the throat, occasionally mild headaches, and often-mild general symptoms – but with no elevation of temperature and a usual duration of four to five days. This stage may be followed by secondary infections caused by other germs that happen to be present in the nose and throat. The secondary stage is accompanied by a thick, yellow discharge, and runs a typical sub acute course of two or three weeks.
Nature has provided man with remarkable local defences against these bacterial invaders. At the entrance of the nasal passage are tiny hairs, called vibrissae, which filter out the larger particles of foreign material in the air. Next in the defence system are numerous glands located throughout the membranes of the nose. These glands constantly produced a moist, slightly sticky secretion, which covers the surfaces of the membranes with a mucous film. The film is in constant approximately every ten minutes. It has been estimated that 75 percent of the dust and germs present in the air are removed in this manner.
The mucous film also protects the delicate membranes of the nose from mechanical injury by particles of dust. It is extremely difficult for bacteria to find their way through this mucous covering as long as it remains intact. On the other hand, underlying membranes opens a portal of entry for infection.
Last of nature’s defenses are the cilia. These are microscopic, hair like projections covering most of the mucous membranes in the nose. They are in constant wave-like motion, much like fields of grain. They pick up cells and particles of foreign matter and carry these to the pharynx, from which they are discharged or swallowed.
Nasal preparations may be harmful precisely because they can destroy or interfere with this defence system. Drying and medicated oils first slow and eventually stop the action of the cilia. Their constant use may even destroy respiratory epithelium. More important, nasal sprays or oils, though they may give temporary relief of congestion and stuffiness, frequently produce a distinction and stuffiness, frequently produce a distinct irritation of the nasal mucous membranes, in this way facilitating the path of secondary bacterial infection.
Finally, there is always the danger of a specific type of pneumonia that may result from the inhalation of oily substances into the
lungs. For all of these reasons, nose and throat specialists warn against the introduction of medicinal preparations into the nose. It should be done only when definitely indicated and recommended by a physician for the treatment of some specific condition.
Equally useless are the mouthwashes, gargles and antiseptics urged by advertisers upon the public. These preparations may destroy germs in test tubes if given sufficient time. But none of them acts instantaneously, nor are they effective in the weak solutions that can be tolerated by the membranes of the nose and throat. Furthermore, only a very small proportion of the membranes of the nose and throat can possibly be reached by sprays and gargles.
Several other more or less universal home remedies proved valueless in our studies. Cathartics of various kinds, for example, have long figured in home treatment of colds, and are included in many of the advertised remedies. Fear of increasing that popularity prevented us from using it in our series of studies. Scientifically, there may be some basis, or perhaps excuse, for the use of alcohol in colds. It causes an increase in the blood flow to the skin, with a resultant feeling of warmth if one is wet and chilled. On the other hand, alcohol itself causes nasal congestion in some people; and many reliable studies have shown that its continuous or excessive use lowers resistance to pneumonia, the most serious complication of colds.
Style: The author has given a detailed description about the use of old and new remedies for curing common ailments. He quotes studies and investigations. Hence, the style is Descriptive.