Exercises in Style is a collection of 99 retellings of the same story, each in a different style. In each, the narrator gets on the "S" bus (now no. 84), witnesses an altercation between a man with a long neck and funny hat and another passenger, and then sees the same person two hours later at the Gare St.-Lazare getting advice on adding a button to his overcoat.

The retellings range from breathless to hilarious (especially "Maladroit", where the narrator recaps in one sentence the entire preceding page), and the collection is a brilliant display of literary mastery.

The book was translated from the French into English by Barbara Wright in 1958, into Italian by Umberto Eco, into Dutch by Rudy Kousbroek, and into German by Ludwig Harig and Eugen Helmlé.