Copy! Its Good.

One of the best ways for an artist to practice a craft is to emulate the style of its masters. It’s harder than it sounds. You have to do more than just copy surface attributes. You have to understand how they do what they do, what makes it work, and why it affects you. As you practice and emulate different artists, you’ll discover your own style.

Musicians work this way, and in their early careers they’re often labeled as “a young Charlie Parker” or “the new Jerry Lee Lewis” (we still have the old one, by the way, no need for another). Some never grow out of copying and fade away, but others develop their own sound, their own style, and become the models for future artists.

For writers, it’s particularly easy to fall into copying great writers and that’s a perfectly cromulent way to practice one’s craft. Write a piece like Jane Austin or Ernest Hemingway. Write like Edgar Allen Poe or Arthur Conan Doyle. Try Vonnegut or Capote or Greene. I dare you. It’s much more difficult than you might imagine.

I, for one, have been reading my favorite books from my favorite author, Mark Twain. These novels are masterworks. I find that as I lose myself in these books that his style creeps into my own. It’s fun to try and see how the language works in practice. And it’s damned difficult.

For today’s exercise, select one of your favorite authors and write a short piece using their style. You do not have to use their subject material, just their personal style. For example, write a short piece about preparing a meal using this appropriated style.

This is a good assignment to repeat as often as you can.
You may leave your completed assignment in the comments section below. 

This assignment is from Writing Assignments by Randy Murray.