Imitation can be a useful method of teaching students to write well. Imitations may be "loose" or "close." Loose imitation aims for faint resemblance; it requires a perception of a particular model that looks at its most conspicuous features, such as tone, arrangement of ideas, and the general character of the diction. Close imitation aims at strong resemblance and therefore requires rigorous analysis. The student must deal with the model concretely, as a piece of writing, and the instructor must track every rhetorical effect to its source. As a procedure, close imitation fills one of the most conspicuous gaps in modern rhetorical theory, the absence of a practical heuristic. Close imitation also may produce in the student a heightened sense of form and sharpens the student's sense of style. This paper concludes that close imitation formalizes and condenses a natural impulse to write. (TS)