D.H. Lawrence begins “The Rocking-Horse Winner” as if it is a fairy tale. The first half of the first paragraph is only concerned with the life of one woman.
To start: “There was a woman who was beautiful, who started with all the advantages, yet she had no luck.” The possibilities are endless, following this sentence’s modifying clauses, which bring the reader down much as the woman must have been brought down. The sentence relives the experience.
Then, shorter: “She married for love, and the love turned to dust.” A compound sentence that brings to mind death, (“to dust we all return,” after all) and the disappointment of knowing that though love has ceased, the marriage remains, and will remain until the participants are dust as well. The upside-down fairy-tale continues, with love that dies and a marriage at the beginning of the story.
A longer sentence: “She had bonny children, yet she felt they had been thrust upon her, and she could not love them.” Another series of three, building on the clauses from the previous sentence. The rhyming and similar rhythms of, “and the love turned to dust,” and, “she felt they had been thrust,” hits the ear like a nursery rhyme done badly.
Back to shorter: “They looked at her coldly, as if they were finding fault with her.” The narrator has now opened the narrative to include the actions of others, but the thoughts and experiences are still hers.
The fewest modifying clauses yet: “And hurriedly she felt she must cover up some fault in herself.” More of her experiences, now made internal. The repetition of “fault” indicates that the problem is uncertain, but she thinks that they are right, that a flaw does exist, and that by hiding it from them, she will hide it from herself.
And again: “Yet what it was that she must cover up she never knew.” Where Lawrence might use commas to break sentences into smaller pieces, he instead leaves the the sense of urgency that the lack of commas imply. In this case it highlights her uncertainty and self-doubt.
The sentence grows again: “Nevertheless, when her children were present, she always felt the centre of her heart grow hard.” The fairy tale beginning of this sentence also leaves the reader lulled, soothed to what comes next. This woman seems to know where the center of her heart is because of its relationship to her children, and its hardness.
The narrator uses the beginning of the paragraph to create a fairy tale space in which this woman exists within her world without being, “wife” or, “mother.” She is an independent operator for a few sentences, and that provides a narrative viewpoint of substantial complexity.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Monday, September 28, 2009
Assignment for 9/29 - Orwell
“In prose, the worst thing you can do with words is to surrender them.”
George Orwell’s style is authoritative. From the first sentence, “Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it,” it is obvious that the writer is about to Have Definite Opinions. He is not writing to puzzle a matter over. He is writing to state his case, and if you don’t like it, you shouldn’t read it, since you probably wouldn’t agree with him anyway. He commands vocabulary, sentence structure, and thought with such facility, that it is easy to be swept away.
He shows problems in the English language, and explains how they effect political discourse, which in turn effects the lives and, in some cases, deaths of people all around the world. “... to think clearly is a necessary first step towards political regeneration: so that the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers.” There is a method to his writing. He is showing all the ways in which the English language can be used to persuade, as he convinces his readership that there is something wrong with English as she is writ, and further, that English can be saved from its own dustbin.
Orwell’s definition of what makes for good political writing follows Strunk and White very closely. He would be in automatic opposition to the notion of “style” as we have been discussing it, but for a single sentence at the end of the essay. “I have not here been considering the literary use of language, but merely language as an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought.” The “literary use of language,” apparently, is doing something other than expressing thought. Not precisely concealing or preventing it, but another remove is present in his lexicon of what sort of language belongs where.
He is exquisitely aware throughout his writing. He keeps track of what it is doing, even to the point where he acknowledges that he has been breaking his own rules. His sixth rule is the most important: “Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.” He bows to style even as he attempts to prescribe it, opening the door to the almost inevitable conclusion that having a conscious style is the most important part of writing anything.
He blames lazy thought for the preponderance of bad writing. He blames a society that rewards stock phrases arranged in a way that hits the ear well while saying nothing. (See Clinton’s inaugural speech.) He blames politicians who are not interested in having their meaning understood. He does not use anaphora.
What Orwell does do is vary his sentence structures. He writes in compound-complex sentences with many modifying clauses, or he writes in shorter sentences, or somewhere in between. His writing is periodic, thought out beforehand to the last comma. He is fond of parallelisms and of weighing one part of his paragraph against another part, using phrases like, “On the contrary,” and, “On the other hand.” In a looser style, he would be accused of talking to himself. But in this piece, he is most clearly writing to himself. The difference is startling. His style is often hypotactic, but never less than strategic. His voice is consistently strident and often caustic. He does not fall into the trap of the writing he complains about because he is writing about something concrete. Writing is not abstract. It might be about abstractions, but words and punctuation can be pinned down and taken apart.
George Orwell’s style is authoritative. From the first sentence, “Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it,” it is obvious that the writer is about to Have Definite Opinions. He is not writing to puzzle a matter over. He is writing to state his case, and if you don’t like it, you shouldn’t read it, since you probably wouldn’t agree with him anyway. He commands vocabulary, sentence structure, and thought with such facility, that it is easy to be swept away.
He shows problems in the English language, and explains how they effect political discourse, which in turn effects the lives and, in some cases, deaths of people all around the world. “... to think clearly is a necessary first step towards political regeneration: so that the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers.” There is a method to his writing. He is showing all the ways in which the English language can be used to persuade, as he convinces his readership that there is something wrong with English as she is writ, and further, that English can be saved from its own dustbin.
Orwell’s definition of what makes for good political writing follows Strunk and White very closely. He would be in automatic opposition to the notion of “style” as we have been discussing it, but for a single sentence at the end of the essay. “I have not here been considering the literary use of language, but merely language as an instrument for expressing and not for concealing or preventing thought.” The “literary use of language,” apparently, is doing something other than expressing thought. Not precisely concealing or preventing it, but another remove is present in his lexicon of what sort of language belongs where.
He is exquisitely aware throughout his writing. He keeps track of what it is doing, even to the point where he acknowledges that he has been breaking his own rules. His sixth rule is the most important: “Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.” He bows to style even as he attempts to prescribe it, opening the door to the almost inevitable conclusion that having a conscious style is the most important part of writing anything.
He blames lazy thought for the preponderance of bad writing. He blames a society that rewards stock phrases arranged in a way that hits the ear well while saying nothing. (See Clinton’s inaugural speech.) He blames politicians who are not interested in having their meaning understood. He does not use anaphora.
What Orwell does do is vary his sentence structures. He writes in compound-complex sentences with many modifying clauses, or he writes in shorter sentences, or somewhere in between. His writing is periodic, thought out beforehand to the last comma. He is fond of parallelisms and of weighing one part of his paragraph against another part, using phrases like, “On the contrary,” and, “On the other hand.” In a looser style, he would be accused of talking to himself. But in this piece, he is most clearly writing to himself. The difference is startling. His style is often hypotactic, but never less than strategic. His voice is consistently strident and often caustic. He does not fall into the trap of the writing he complains about because he is writing about something concrete. Writing is not abstract. It might be about abstractions, but words and punctuation can be pinned down and taken apart.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Assignment for 9/23 - Lanham summary
In Chapter 5, Lanham writes (talks) about voice (in writing). He is amplifying what he has been saying all along in Analyzing Prose. Different voices come through different styles. Prose is shaped by style. Voice is shaped by style. Point of view and meaning are shaped by style. Understanding how a piece is written is essential to fully understand what that piece is trying to get across.
This follows from what Lanham has been saying from the beginning of the introduction. Writing is much more like speaking than the stilted language of textbooks. Writers have individual personalities, and they come out of their prose in different ways. They use style to accomplish this feat of telepathic time travel, beaming from their time and mind to ours, becoming distinct -- through style.
Prose is one of the most flexible forms of communication we have. The same things that define our speech -- vocabulary, cadence, diction, rhythm -- appear in our writing, with similar effect. The subtle difference is that you can get away with things in speech that become glaringly obvious in writing, and so writing has to be more careful. More choosy about what tactics it employs, and when. Repetition is more jarring when repeated on the page, and alliteration more alarming. At the same time, reading aloud a piece of writing is a way of teasing out the writer's unique style in any given piece.
When Lanham writes about parataxis and hypotaxis, running and periodic styles, saccades, suspension, parallelism, anaphora, and isocolons, he is explaining the tools, or elements (if you will) of style. Strunk & White were unnecessarily prescriptive, but they popularized a great phrase.
This follows from what Lanham has been saying from the beginning of the introduction. Writing is much more like speaking than the stilted language of textbooks. Writers have individual personalities, and they come out of their prose in different ways. They use style to accomplish this feat of telepathic time travel, beaming from their time and mind to ours, becoming distinct -- through style.
Prose is one of the most flexible forms of communication we have. The same things that define our speech -- vocabulary, cadence, diction, rhythm -- appear in our writing, with similar effect. The subtle difference is that you can get away with things in speech that become glaringly obvious in writing, and so writing has to be more careful. More choosy about what tactics it employs, and when. Repetition is more jarring when repeated on the page, and alliteration more alarming. At the same time, reading aloud a piece of writing is a way of teasing out the writer's unique style in any given piece.
When Lanham writes about parataxis and hypotaxis, running and periodic styles, saccades, suspension, parallelism, anaphora, and isocolons, he is explaining the tools, or elements (if you will) of style. Strunk & White were unnecessarily prescriptive, but they popularized a great phrase.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Assignment for 9/21 - Joyce
General thoughts:
“Grace” begins with the reader dropped into the action. The detailed descriptions are made vague because we, as readers, have no context for them. Such writing leads to a sense of universality, as if this is a situation that happens in dozens of pubs every week, and we are reading this particular story by chance.
For almost two pages of prose, there are no proper names, adding to the feelings of being adrift without a real narrative anchor outlined above. This contrasts with the rest of the story, which focuses on names and the histories of the people who belong to them. There are a lot of names in this short story, and they are repeated often. Characters are never mentioned by their first names by the narrator. Tom Kernan, our unfortunate hero, is the one who is most often called by his first name by his friends. (The least religious of them all, think of the allusion to Doubting Thomas in the resurrection story.) His friends’ names have built-in meanings, as well. Mr Power, Mr Cunning-ham, Mr M’-Coy. Name meanings can never be truly prescriptive, but if meaning can be found, we should look.
One of the many things that Joyce does very well is dialogue. He has an ear that lets him write people in a way that leaves them distinct, and is able to balance conversations between more than two people, something that is hard to do well.
Grace, as pointed to in the title of the story, is a recurring theme throughout. There are parallels between grace and the saga of Mr Kernan’s silk hat, which has almost as active a role in the story as he does. There is a description of him that says, “He had never been seen in the city without a silk hat of some decency and a pair of gaiters. By grace of these two articles of clothing, he said, a man could always pass muster. (258, emphasis mine.) When the story begins, the hat is seen away from its owner, “rolled a few yards away.” (255) It is described as “a dinged silk hat” when brought upstairs by one of the gentlemen who carried Mr Kernan up. (255) By the end of the story, when Mr Kernan goes to church with his friends, “His hat, which had been rehabilitated by his wife, rested upon his knees... he held the brim of his hat lightly, but firmly, with the other hand.” (273) His hat is a part of him. Perhaps it embodies his sense of dignity, or hope.
Sentence-specific wallowing:
Joyce varies his sentence length throughout a passage. Given that he introduces a character before he gives their backstory, his writing is usually paratactic rather than cumulative, since we already know where they are at the present moment. He is filling in the gaps, not building to an assessment of their characters. The description of Mrs Kernan is a case in point.
There is a pattern of sentences arranged in the negative. “Not long before she had celebrated her silver wedding...” “In her days of courtship, Mr Kernan had seemed to her a not ungallant figure...” “The part of mother presented to her no insuperable difficulties...” This pattern creates a sense on the one hand of judicious measuring, and on the other, of detachment. Pattern 18 out of Sullivan appears in the first example, with past participles. “Not long before, she had celebrated her silver wedding and renewed her intimacy with her husband...” (259, emphasis mine.) Some of the negations in these sentences would seem to be prime candidates for paired constructions, (Patterns 16, 16a) but they remain unresolved. This leaves the sentence off-balance, and contributes to the sense of detachment that weaves through Mrs Kernan’s description.
“In her days of courtship, Mr Kernan had seemed to her a not ungallant figure: and she still hurried to the chapel door whenever a wedding was reported and, seeing the bridal pair, recalled with vivid pleasure how she had passed out of the Star of the Sea Church in Sandymount, leaning on the arm of a jovial well-fed man, who was dressed smartly in a frock-coat and lavender trousers and carried a silk hat gracefully balanced upon his other arm.” (And there’s that hat again, with “gracefully” modifiying it, to boot.)
This compound-complex sentence is near-dizzying in its attempts to impart information. It is only of the only paragraphs in Joyce that graze the hypotactic, but it is not as much cumulative as it is in the running style. These are still pieces of information presented with the syntactical democracy of parataxis, but they are loose, following one another, though not truly building on each other. It is description for its own sake, without an agenda beyond providing more information about a character.
“Grace” begins with the reader dropped into the action. The detailed descriptions are made vague because we, as readers, have no context for them. Such writing leads to a sense of universality, as if this is a situation that happens in dozens of pubs every week, and we are reading this particular story by chance.
For almost two pages of prose, there are no proper names, adding to the feelings of being adrift without a real narrative anchor outlined above. This contrasts with the rest of the story, which focuses on names and the histories of the people who belong to them. There are a lot of names in this short story, and they are repeated often. Characters are never mentioned by their first names by the narrator. Tom Kernan, our unfortunate hero, is the one who is most often called by his first name by his friends. (The least religious of them all, think of the allusion to Doubting Thomas in the resurrection story.) His friends’ names have built-in meanings, as well. Mr Power, Mr Cunning-ham, Mr M’-Coy. Name meanings can never be truly prescriptive, but if meaning can be found, we should look.
One of the many things that Joyce does very well is dialogue. He has an ear that lets him write people in a way that leaves them distinct, and is able to balance conversations between more than two people, something that is hard to do well.
Grace, as pointed to in the title of the story, is a recurring theme throughout. There are parallels between grace and the saga of Mr Kernan’s silk hat, which has almost as active a role in the story as he does. There is a description of him that says, “He had never been seen in the city without a silk hat of some decency and a pair of gaiters. By grace of these two articles of clothing, he said, a man could always pass muster. (258, emphasis mine.) When the story begins, the hat is seen away from its owner, “rolled a few yards away.” (255) It is described as “a dinged silk hat” when brought upstairs by one of the gentlemen who carried Mr Kernan up. (255) By the end of the story, when Mr Kernan goes to church with his friends, “His hat, which had been rehabilitated by his wife, rested upon his knees... he held the brim of his hat lightly, but firmly, with the other hand.” (273) His hat is a part of him. Perhaps it embodies his sense of dignity, or hope.
Sentence-specific wallowing:
Joyce varies his sentence length throughout a passage. Given that he introduces a character before he gives their backstory, his writing is usually paratactic rather than cumulative, since we already know where they are at the present moment. He is filling in the gaps, not building to an assessment of their characters. The description of Mrs Kernan is a case in point.
There is a pattern of sentences arranged in the negative. “Not long before she had celebrated her silver wedding...” “In her days of courtship, Mr Kernan had seemed to her a not ungallant figure...” “The part of mother presented to her no insuperable difficulties...” This pattern creates a sense on the one hand of judicious measuring, and on the other, of detachment. Pattern 18 out of Sullivan appears in the first example, with past participles. “Not long before, she had celebrated her silver wedding and renewed her intimacy with her husband...” (259, emphasis mine.) Some of the negations in these sentences would seem to be prime candidates for paired constructions, (Patterns 16, 16a) but they remain unresolved. This leaves the sentence off-balance, and contributes to the sense of detachment that weaves through Mrs Kernan’s description.
“In her days of courtship, Mr Kernan had seemed to her a not ungallant figure: and she still hurried to the chapel door whenever a wedding was reported and, seeing the bridal pair, recalled with vivid pleasure how she had passed out of the Star of the Sea Church in Sandymount, leaning on the arm of a jovial well-fed man, who was dressed smartly in a frock-coat and lavender trousers and carried a silk hat gracefully balanced upon his other arm.” (And there’s that hat again, with “gracefully” modifiying it, to boot.)
This compound-complex sentence is near-dizzying in its attempts to impart information. It is only of the only paragraphs in Joyce that graze the hypotactic, but it is not as much cumulative as it is in the running style. These are still pieces of information presented with the syntactical democracy of parataxis, but they are loose, following one another, though not truly building on each other. It is description for its own sake, without an agenda beyond providing more information about a character.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Assignment for 9/16 - Nabokov
Assignment for 9/16 - Nabokov
What is there to say about Nabokov that he hasn’t said about himself? I do not think this is quite fair. After all, it takes so much of the pressure off being a literary genius when you have already said that you are one. But he would be the first to agree that he was very good at styling sentences.
First-person narration is drawn to the running style, with its emphasis on the way people think as they are speaking out loud, or writing. The hypotaxis in Nabokov’s prose uncovers the minutely planned aspects of this piece without taking anything away from the narrator’s voice. A first-person narrator wants to get their story out just right, after all. Each piece of information follows on the one before, but without necessarily building on it. Even when it seems as though the narrator is trending periodic, he will suddenly rein in the intensity of the clauses, and sometimes change the subject entirely. The prose keeps the reader on edge, expecting a climax that never (ironically, given the narrator’s own frustrations) occurs.
"I was born in 1910, in Paris. My father was a gentle, easy-going person, a salad of racial genes: a Swiss citizen, of mixed French and Austrian descent, with a dash of the Danube in his veins. I am going to pass around in a minute some lovely, glossy-blue picture-postcards. He owned a luxurious hotel in the Riviera. His father and two grandfathers had sold wine, jewels, and silk, respectively. At thirty he married an English girl, daughter of Jerome Dunn, the alpinist, and granddaughter of two Dorset parsons, experts in obscure subjects--paleopedology and Aeolian harps, respectively. My very photogenic mother died in a freak accident (picnic, lightning) when I was three, and, save for a pocket of warmth in the darkest past, nothing of her subsists within the hollows and dells of memory, over which, if you can still stand my style (I am writing under observation), the sun of my infancy had set: surely, you all know these redolent remnants of day suspended, with the midges, about some hedge in bloom or suddenly entered and traversed by the rambler, at the bottom of a hill, in the summer dusk; a furry warmth, golden midges."
The first sentence provides the biographical framework for the rest of the paragraph. A man was born in a specific year, in a specific place. But each of those is only apparently specific. We do not know the date, or where they were living. Already, we are drawn in to the first-person narrator, who has things he wants us to know, and things he does not.
“My father was a gentle, easy-going person, a salad of racial genes: a Swiss citizen, of mixed French and Austrian descent, with a dash of the Danube in his veins.” The first part of this compound sentence, before the colon, has the father as its subject, with a few descriptive clauses. In the second part, there is a series of appositives following “a salad of racial genes.” This mixes patterns 3 and 10, in Sullivan’s vernacular.
The next sentence might have wandered in from another piece of fiction, given all the sense it makes.
“He owned a luxurious hotel on the Riviera.” This sentence seems like it is telling the reader something, but only raises more questions.
“His father and two grandfathers had sold wine, jewels and silk, respectively.” There is again description with attending obfuscation. (There should be a sentence pattern number for this.) It seems to mean that his father sold wine, and the two grandfathers sold jewels and silk. But which grandfather sold which combinations of items? Even though it clearly does not matter, it would be nice if the narrator were not handing out information like candy wrappers with nothing inside.
“At thirty,” (note pattern 14, as yet unseen, in the prepositional phrase before subject and verb) “he married an English girl, daughter of Jerome Dunn, the alpinist, and granddaughter of two Dorset parsons, experts in obscure subjects--paleopedology and Aeolian harps, respectively. (Pattern 10a) There is a repetition of sorts in these last two sentences. In this sentence we also get two grandfathers, who are experts in two things “respectively,” and we do not learn which grandfather does which. And, since they are not named, it still does not matter. The narrator is talking about his great-grandfathers, after all. They cannot really have much bearing on his life, except to somehow anchor it.
The next sentence is an avalanche of clauses that definitely depend on one another for sense. (Most probably pattern 8) “My very photogenic mother died in a freak accident (picnic, lightning)” (pattern 7) “when I was three, and, save for a pocket of warmth in the darkest past, nothing of her subsists within the hollows and dells of memory, over which, if you can still stand my style (I am writing under observation), the sun of my infancy had set:” before the narrator changes the game entirely, “surely, you all know these redolent remnants of day suspended, with the midges, about some hedge in bloom or suddenly entered and traversed by the rambler, at the bottom of a hill, in the summer dusk; a furry warmth, golden midges.”
There is a repetition of a keyword (Pattern 9) in the word “midges,” and the only alliteration in the selection, in “redolent remnants of day.” The turn the sentence takes at the colon is dizzying, and probably meant to distract from the mother’s death. The two parenthetical notes, “(picnic, lightning)” and “(I am writing under observation)” are very suggestive, as they indicate the narrator’s super-literary sensibility of himself as a writer who has not explained everything, and is not alone in the process.
There is another repetition in “a pocket of warmth” and “a furry warmth.” “Furry” is the only tactile sensation in the entire paragraph, and “warmth” is what is entirely lacking in it. He is discussing his closest relatives as if they are strangers to be catalogued. He does not speak with genuine authority until the next paragraph. In this one, it seems like he is only reciting. He cannot speak with authority about his mother’s death, and so has to gloss over it.
What is there to say about Nabokov that he hasn’t said about himself? I do not think this is quite fair. After all, it takes so much of the pressure off being a literary genius when you have already said that you are one. But he would be the first to agree that he was very good at styling sentences.
First-person narration is drawn to the running style, with its emphasis on the way people think as they are speaking out loud, or writing. The hypotaxis in Nabokov’s prose uncovers the minutely planned aspects of this piece without taking anything away from the narrator’s voice. A first-person narrator wants to get their story out just right, after all. Each piece of information follows on the one before, but without necessarily building on it. Even when it seems as though the narrator is trending periodic, he will suddenly rein in the intensity of the clauses, and sometimes change the subject entirely. The prose keeps the reader on edge, expecting a climax that never (ironically, given the narrator’s own frustrations) occurs.
"I was born in 1910, in Paris. My father was a gentle, easy-going person, a salad of racial genes: a Swiss citizen, of mixed French and Austrian descent, with a dash of the Danube in his veins. I am going to pass around in a minute some lovely, glossy-blue picture-postcards. He owned a luxurious hotel in the Riviera. His father and two grandfathers had sold wine, jewels, and silk, respectively. At thirty he married an English girl, daughter of Jerome Dunn, the alpinist, and granddaughter of two Dorset parsons, experts in obscure subjects--paleopedology and Aeolian harps, respectively. My very photogenic mother died in a freak accident (picnic, lightning) when I was three, and, save for a pocket of warmth in the darkest past, nothing of her subsists within the hollows and dells of memory, over which, if you can still stand my style (I am writing under observation), the sun of my infancy had set: surely, you all know these redolent remnants of day suspended, with the midges, about some hedge in bloom or suddenly entered and traversed by the rambler, at the bottom of a hill, in the summer dusk; a furry warmth, golden midges."
The first sentence provides the biographical framework for the rest of the paragraph. A man was born in a specific year, in a specific place. But each of those is only apparently specific. We do not know the date, or where they were living. Already, we are drawn in to the first-person narrator, who has things he wants us to know, and things he does not.
“My father was a gentle, easy-going person, a salad of racial genes: a Swiss citizen, of mixed French and Austrian descent, with a dash of the Danube in his veins.” The first part of this compound sentence, before the colon, has the father as its subject, with a few descriptive clauses. In the second part, there is a series of appositives following “a salad of racial genes.” This mixes patterns 3 and 10, in Sullivan’s vernacular.
The next sentence might have wandered in from another piece of fiction, given all the sense it makes.
“He owned a luxurious hotel on the Riviera.” This sentence seems like it is telling the reader something, but only raises more questions.
“His father and two grandfathers had sold wine, jewels and silk, respectively.” There is again description with attending obfuscation. (There should be a sentence pattern number for this.) It seems to mean that his father sold wine, and the two grandfathers sold jewels and silk. But which grandfather sold which combinations of items? Even though it clearly does not matter, it would be nice if the narrator were not handing out information like candy wrappers with nothing inside.
“At thirty,” (note pattern 14, as yet unseen, in the prepositional phrase before subject and verb) “he married an English girl, daughter of Jerome Dunn, the alpinist, and granddaughter of two Dorset parsons, experts in obscure subjects--paleopedology and Aeolian harps, respectively. (Pattern 10a) There is a repetition of sorts in these last two sentences. In this sentence we also get two grandfathers, who are experts in two things “respectively,” and we do not learn which grandfather does which. And, since they are not named, it still does not matter. The narrator is talking about his great-grandfathers, after all. They cannot really have much bearing on his life, except to somehow anchor it.
The next sentence is an avalanche of clauses that definitely depend on one another for sense. (Most probably pattern 8) “My very photogenic mother died in a freak accident (picnic, lightning)” (pattern 7) “when I was three, and, save for a pocket of warmth in the darkest past, nothing of her subsists within the hollows and dells of memory, over which, if you can still stand my style (I am writing under observation), the sun of my infancy had set:” before the narrator changes the game entirely, “surely, you all know these redolent remnants of day suspended, with the midges, about some hedge in bloom or suddenly entered and traversed by the rambler, at the bottom of a hill, in the summer dusk; a furry warmth, golden midges.”
There is a repetition of a keyword (Pattern 9) in the word “midges,” and the only alliteration in the selection, in “redolent remnants of day.” The turn the sentence takes at the colon is dizzying, and probably meant to distract from the mother’s death. The two parenthetical notes, “(picnic, lightning)” and “(I am writing under observation)” are very suggestive, as they indicate the narrator’s super-literary sensibility of himself as a writer who has not explained everything, and is not alone in the process.
There is another repetition in “a pocket of warmth” and “a furry warmth.” “Furry” is the only tactile sensation in the entire paragraph, and “warmth” is what is entirely lacking in it. He is discussing his closest relatives as if they are strangers to be catalogued. He does not speak with genuine authority until the next paragraph. In this one, it seems like he is only reciting. He cannot speak with authority about his mother’s death, and so has to gloss over it.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Assignment for 9/14 - Clinton
Clinton's speech:
This is a piece of writing meant to be spoken out loud. The punctuation supports its purpose, reminding the speaker when to push through, and when to pause for effect. It is designed to pull an audience in.
Anaphora appears several times in this speech, highlighting the ways in which the speech is targeting its hearers. Beginning in paragraph 13: “But when most people are working... when others cannot work... when the cost of health care devastates... when fear of crime robs... when millions of poor children cannot even imagine...” All this happens in one sentence. Each of the above is a clause separated by semi-colons. At the end of the speech, there is another case of anaphora, this time in full sentences.
“An idea born in revolution and renewed through 2 centuries of challenge. An idea tempered by the knowledge that, but for fate, we--the fortunate and the unfortunate--might have been each other. An idea ennobled by the faith that our nation can summon from its myriad diversity the deepest measure of unity. An idea infused with the conviction that America’s long heroic journey must go forever upward.” (Paragraph 39)
Notice the progression of the verbs beginning the sentences. “Born in revolution... tempered by the knowledge that... ennobled by the faith that... infused with the conviction that...” These are fighting words. While the second sentence is in more of a running style, the rest are periodic. These sentences are primarily paratactic in nature, but build on each other in the periodic style. They are reaching towards the clarion call of paragraph 40. This is language to rouse the rabble, and it works.
The repetition that sweeps a listener along might become tedious to a reader. Whereas a reader, able to go back and underline each time a word is used, (as this one certainly did) might get tired of “America,” “change,” “sacrifice,” and “generation,” a listener is only left with the feelings and personal associations these buzzwords inspire.
Clinton’s vocabulary is not simplistic. He uses many polysyllabic words. But he also defines them as he is speaking. In paragraph 23, he says, “Our Founders saw themselves in the light of posterity. We can do no less. Anyone who has ever watched a child’s eyes wander into sleep knows what posterity is.” So far, he is assuming that his audience understands the word, if not the somewhat strange metaphor. Then he says, “Posterity is the world to come--the world for whom we hold our ideals, from whom we have borrowed our planet, and to whom we bear sacred responsibility.” He is educating as he is orating. The clauses are periodic, planned in light of the emotional response he wants to wring from his audience.
Political oratory is all about making an audience agree with the person speaking. This speech succeeds without pressing too hard on the listeners. It is a speech meant to inspire.
This is a piece of writing meant to be spoken out loud. The punctuation supports its purpose, reminding the speaker when to push through, and when to pause for effect. It is designed to pull an audience in.
Anaphora appears several times in this speech, highlighting the ways in which the speech is targeting its hearers. Beginning in paragraph 13: “But when most people are working... when others cannot work... when the cost of health care devastates... when fear of crime robs... when millions of poor children cannot even imagine...” All this happens in one sentence. Each of the above is a clause separated by semi-colons. At the end of the speech, there is another case of anaphora, this time in full sentences.
“An idea born in revolution and renewed through 2 centuries of challenge. An idea tempered by the knowledge that, but for fate, we--the fortunate and the unfortunate--might have been each other. An idea ennobled by the faith that our nation can summon from its myriad diversity the deepest measure of unity. An idea infused with the conviction that America’s long heroic journey must go forever upward.” (Paragraph 39)
Notice the progression of the verbs beginning the sentences. “Born in revolution... tempered by the knowledge that... ennobled by the faith that... infused with the conviction that...” These are fighting words. While the second sentence is in more of a running style, the rest are periodic. These sentences are primarily paratactic in nature, but build on each other in the periodic style. They are reaching towards the clarion call of paragraph 40. This is language to rouse the rabble, and it works.
The repetition that sweeps a listener along might become tedious to a reader. Whereas a reader, able to go back and underline each time a word is used, (as this one certainly did) might get tired of “America,” “change,” “sacrifice,” and “generation,” a listener is only left with the feelings and personal associations these buzzwords inspire.
Clinton’s vocabulary is not simplistic. He uses many polysyllabic words. But he also defines them as he is speaking. In paragraph 23, he says, “Our Founders saw themselves in the light of posterity. We can do no less. Anyone who has ever watched a child’s eyes wander into sleep knows what posterity is.” So far, he is assuming that his audience understands the word, if not the somewhat strange metaphor. Then he says, “Posterity is the world to come--the world for whom we hold our ideals, from whom we have borrowed our planet, and to whom we bear sacred responsibility.” He is educating as he is orating. The clauses are periodic, planned in light of the emotional response he wants to wring from his audience.
Political oratory is all about making an audience agree with the person speaking. This speech succeeds without pressing too hard on the listeners. It is a speech meant to inspire.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Assignment for 9/9 - Saul Bellow
Then for the rest of the week Woody was busy, had jobs to run, office responsibilities, family responsibilities. He lived alone; as did his wife; as did his mistress: everybody in a separate establishment. Since his wife, after fifteen years of separation, had not learned to take care of herself, Woody did her shopping on Fridays, filled her freezer. He had to take her this week to buy shoes. Also, Friday night he always spent with Helen—Helen was his wife de facto. Saturday he did his big weekly shopping. Saturday night he devoted to Mom and his sisters. So he was too busy to attend to his own feelings except, intermittently, to note to himself, “First Thursday in the grave.” “First Friday, and fine weather.” “First Saturday; he’s got to be getting used to it.” Under his breath he occasionally said, “Oh, Pop."
Lanham claims that there is usually perfect syntactical marriage between subject and style in fiction, because fiction "creates the reality it describes." (Lanham 41) The beauty of Bellow's sentences is in how they provide information about, not only the narrative in which they occur, but the subtext as well. The parataxis in this passage mirrors the information that Woody was habitually too busy to think, especially about his father. Think about the life that is described here. Woody is a man with a wife who he's been taking care of for fifteen years of separation, a mistress, his mother, sisters, shopping for two households, everything compartmentalized in the sentences as it must be in Woody's head.
Bellow's sentences vary between short fragments, and longer, more complicated strings. "Since his wife, after fifteen years of separation, had not learned to take care of herself, Woody did her shopping on Fridays, filled her freezer." The hypotaxis leads us on a path through the relevant information, (Woody has a wife, separated for fifteen years, she still relies on him for everything)
and suggests fatigue by the time it arrives at, "filled her freezer." This is a woman who will not do a thing for herself, and we feel Woody's unspoken exhaustion at having to do for her, even though the matter-of-fact litany underscores the fact that Woody will not do anything but cater to her.
The next sentence, "Also, Friday night he always spent with Helen—Helen was his wife de facto," calls the reader's attention back to what immediately precedes it. He shops and provides for his wife on Fridays, but he spends his Friday nights with his "de facto" wife. I.e., the woman he sleeps with. The guilt is built into the structure of the sentences. It continues with, "Saturday he did his weekly big shopping. Saturday night he devoted to Mom and his sisters." His weekend is spent being dutiful, even to his own mistress. Note that "de facto" is not italicized. It is just part of the vocabulary used to describe Woody's life, and no other attention is called to it.
Repetition forms a big part of the description of Woody's schedule, as it does in the schedule itself. "Office responsibilities, family responsibilities," "He lived alone, as did his wife, as did his mistress." "Everybody body in a separate establishment... after fifteen years of separation." Friday repeats, Saturday repeats, then later on they repeat again as he thinks about his father lying in the ground. Woody's life is busy, lived by rote, except for the occasional flashes of what is going on in the ultimate resting position of death.
The way Woody pauses, "to note to himself" about his father's death is more like how someone would write in a diary. “First Thursday in the grave.” “First Friday, and fine weather.” “First Saturday; he’s got to be getting used to it.” Only in the third 'note' does Woody even disassociate himself from the man in the ground. Woody, by the construction of the first two 'notes,' might be the dead one. He even says, "Oh, Pop," under his breath.
Bellow's sentences are suited to the information and the feelings that they are trying to convey. This introduction to Woody's schedule is also a valuable window into what is important to him, and how he moves within his own life.
Lanham claims that there is usually perfect syntactical marriage between subject and style in fiction, because fiction "creates the reality it describes." (Lanham 41) The beauty of Bellow's sentences is in how they provide information about, not only the narrative in which they occur, but the subtext as well. The parataxis in this passage mirrors the information that Woody was habitually too busy to think, especially about his father. Think about the life that is described here. Woody is a man with a wife who he's been taking care of for fifteen years of separation, a mistress, his mother, sisters, shopping for two households, everything compartmentalized in the sentences as it must be in Woody's head.
Bellow's sentences vary between short fragments, and longer, more complicated strings. "Since his wife, after fifteen years of separation, had not learned to take care of herself, Woody did her shopping on Fridays, filled her freezer." The hypotaxis leads us on a path through the relevant information, (Woody has a wife, separated for fifteen years, she still relies on him for everything)
and suggests fatigue by the time it arrives at, "filled her freezer." This is a woman who will not do a thing for herself, and we feel Woody's unspoken exhaustion at having to do for her, even though the matter-of-fact litany underscores the fact that Woody will not do anything but cater to her.
The next sentence, "Also, Friday night he always spent with Helen—Helen was his wife de facto," calls the reader's attention back to what immediately precedes it. He shops and provides for his wife on Fridays, but he spends his Friday nights with his "de facto" wife. I.e., the woman he sleeps with. The guilt is built into the structure of the sentences. It continues with, "Saturday he did his weekly big shopping. Saturday night he devoted to Mom and his sisters." His weekend is spent being dutiful, even to his own mistress. Note that "de facto" is not italicized. It is just part of the vocabulary used to describe Woody's life, and no other attention is called to it.
Repetition forms a big part of the description of Woody's schedule, as it does in the schedule itself. "Office responsibilities, family responsibilities," "He lived alone, as did his wife, as did his mistress." "Everybody body in a separate establishment... after fifteen years of separation." Friday repeats, Saturday repeats, then later on they repeat again as he thinks about his father lying in the ground. Woody's life is busy, lived by rote, except for the occasional flashes of what is going on in the ultimate resting position of death.
The way Woody pauses, "to note to himself" about his father's death is more like how someone would write in a diary. “First Thursday in the grave.” “First Friday, and fine weather.” “First Saturday; he’s got to be getting used to it.” Only in the third 'note' does Woody even disassociate himself from the man in the ground. Woody, by the construction of the first two 'notes,' might be the dead one. He even says, "Oh, Pop," under his breath.
Bellow's sentences are suited to the information and the feelings that they are trying to convey. This introduction to Woody's schedule is also a valuable window into what is important to him, and how he moves within his own life.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Assignment for 9/2
Finding an example of the verb style was not difficult, reading the Sports section of the New York Times. I found the following excerpt in an article covering the US Open:
"Dent will play Ivan Navarro of Spain, and despite all the surgical work on his back, he said he felt no pain or discomfort after the 2-hour-50-minute match. After dropping the first set, he swept the next two, then held on in the fourth to win on his serve.
"When López, who argued and complained throughout about lines calls, hit a backhand into the net on match point, Dent took a deep breath, held his fists up near his face and screamed in exultation."*Using emphasis: "Dent will play Ivan Navarro of Spain... After dropping the first set, he swept the next two, then held on in the fourth to win on his serve. When Lopez, who argued and complained throughout about lines calls, hit a backhand into the next on match point, Dent took a deep breath, held his fists up near his face, and screamed in exultation."
Verb styles create excitement. In this case, the verb style lends energy to a piece that is reporting an emotional and athletic event. There is also occasional alliteration, as in "Dent...deep," and, "fists...face." The action in the excerpt is made gripping by the use of verbs like "dropping," "swept," "held on," and so on.
The kinds of verbs used also draw attention to where the writer's sympathies lie. Lopez, "argued and complained throughout," while Dent, "swept the next two, then held on... to win." It is not conclusive, by any means, but the kinds of words a writer uses are just as important as how the words are used.
Finding something written in the noun style was more difficult, but the Science Times proved invaluable:
"The reason that many computer scientists are pursuing this goal is that the shrinking of the transistor has approached fundamental physical limits. Increasingly, transistor manufacturers grapple with subatomic effects, like the tendency for electrons to “leak” across material boundaries. The leaking electrons make it more difficult to know when a transistor is in an on or off state, the information that makes electronic computing possible. They have also led to excess heat, the bane of the fastest computer chips.
"The transistor is not just another element of the electronic world. It is the invention that made the computer revolution possible. In essence it is an on-off switch controlled by the flow of electricity. For the purposes of computing, when the switch is on it represents a one. When it is off it represents a zero. These zeros and ones are the most basic language of computers."**
A few excerpts with emphasis:
- "The reason that many computer scientists are pursuing this goal is that the shrinking of the transistor has approached fundamental physical limits."
- "The transistor is not just another element of the electronic world.
- In essence it is an on-off switch controlled by the flow of electricity."
- "These zeros and ones are the most basic language of computers."
The voice in this piece is expecting a readership with a certain foundation of knowledge, and at least a passing interest in what is being reported. It is conversational, and perhaps slightly condescending.
It is easy to connect with the first piece because of the action and emotion involved. Verbs indicate an experience the reader can relate to, even if they have never touched a tennis racket. The second piece requires more thought, because it deals with ideas and realities that need longer words.
Nouns represent abstract collections of knowledge held together in small packages, subject to varying interpretation based on individual experience. Verbs hold on to their readers.
*http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/02/sports/tennis/02night.html?_r=1&hp
**http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/01/science/01trans.html?ref=science
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