The Brother, bathed and fed, had been taken in to sleep with the grown-ups; now, fussing, he was carried out by the Mother, who stood on the verandah with him still in her arms, her arms always reaching for him when they were not otherwise occupied, an apology of arms always reaching for him.
The Archer, by Shruti Swamy
Can you feel the Mother’s love for Brother? Not a normal love, but a desperate, clinging love for Brother, who, if Mother isn’t cooking or cleaning, is cradled in Mother’s arms.
The story is told from the older sister’s point of view who watches with envy Mother’s feverish love for her young Brother. But you probably felt that, too, that smoldering jealousy, observing Mother and all that she touches.
My English teacher in junior high required us to buy and bring to class a thesaurus. The English language is replete with wonderful words, she’d say. Use them! I dutifully cracked open my thick thesaurus and never repeated for fear of the angry red pen.
So what about Swamy’s sentence? Thankfully she defies the English teachers of the universe and uses lots of repetition, which beautifully renders the Mother’s intense, insatiable feelings for Brother. The word “arms” is repeated three times and twice we hear the phrase “always reaching for him.”
This phrase is an example of epistrophe, the rhetorical term for the repetition of word(s) or phrases at the end of clauses or successive sentences. “It’s the trope of obsession,” writes Mark Forsyth in The Elements of Eloquence.
The syntactical structure stamps this critical word—arms-- into your brain through repetition, and you can’t help but feel the obsession.
Swamy heightens the obsession by using anadiplosis, in which a word(s) or phrase at or near the end of a phrase or clause is repeated at the beginning of the next clause or phrase. “…who stood on the verandah with him still in her arms, her arms always reaching for him…”
The repetition also creates a different rhythm, interrupting what would otherwise be a straightforward clause, making it far more interesting to hear.
Swamy adds that lovely and unusual wording, pairing things that are not usually found together: “an apology of arms.” The noun—apology—is modified by the prepositional phrase—of arms—giving agency to the arms. The arms are making the apology. I love it! I’m not sure what to call this—a metaphor? Personification?
The Making:
To use Swamy’s architecture:
It’s a mid-branching sentence with the subject—Brother—separated from the verb—had been taken. The verb is delayed by the modifiers “bathed and fed.”
Now use a semicolon and connect another sentence, which is left-branching, opening with the modifiers “now, fussing.” Add a subject and verb predicate—he was carried out by the Mother. Here’s your chance to use repetition by adding modifiers to this sentence.
Mother
#1 who stood on the verandah with him still in her arms
#2 her arms always reaching for him when they were not otherwise occupied
#3 an apology of arms always reaching for him
Can you repeat the last word(s) of the first clause and use these word(s) at the beginning of the second clause? Here Swamy repeated “her arms.”
Now in the third modifying phrase, can you repeat the beginning of the second clause and put it at the end of the third modifier? Here Swamy repeated, “her arms always reaching for him.”
The sound that rang out to me was the repetition of the vowel sound in this string of words: Brother, Mother, arm, always, otherwise, occupied, and apology. This unity of sound is wonderful, highlighting the primary words that are the older sister’s obsession.
What a beautiful sentence!
Give it a try!
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The repetition of 'arms' is very effective in this sentence. I too like the striking phrase 'an apology of arms'. And I also like the repetition of 'always reaching for him'. The emotion of this is powerful. My sentence (as close as I could get to the original syntax, but not quite there) is here:
She kept her photographs, bound and labelled, always nearby; until, slipping away, she let them lie, dust-filmed, then buried beneath a growing mound of paper on her reading table—letters she forgot to open, lists to help her remember, remember that there should be meals, and medicines, and schedules, remember she must not wander beyond this room, where, somewhere, her memories were buried, bound and labelled.