So true that we tend to group things in threes; it seems natural (maybe something biological or musical?), and because of that I have to remind myself to go with two sometimes, or, yes, four. I've never heard of Bellow's "four or more" rule, but I like it!
Four or more! I like that. And I'm thinking there's room in such a list of descriptors to add effects , on top of the in-built effect such a piling up has--you could escalate or de-escalate, for example; build up to a crescendo and then back off. Time to experiment.
This is my attempt:
To persevere, to sacrifice, to strive, to push against the preconceptions of friends and family, to disprove their predictions, to find yourself in a free and accepting place, to discover joy in a world of knowledge and ideas, to believe that even you might contribute something—only to find yourself confined again by the unyielding walls of bureaucracy and the uninterested, sullen, cynical, suspicious, defiant, prematurely world-weary faces of thirty twelve-year-olds.
To remember, to share, to comfort, to huddle, to bow, to weep—to ache.
What a nice way to use an em dash: as an indicator to a summary. I don't know that I've used it this way before. I think it's been relegated to showing a jump in thought, or a jump away and back.
So true that we tend to group things in threes; it seems natural (maybe something biological or musical?), and because of that I have to remind myself to go with two sometimes, or, yes, four. I've never heard of Bellow's "four or more" rule, but I like it!
Four or more! I like that. And I'm thinking there's room in such a list of descriptors to add effects , on top of the in-built effect such a piling up has--you could escalate or de-escalate, for example; build up to a crescendo and then back off. Time to experiment.
This is my attempt:
To persevere, to sacrifice, to strive, to push against the preconceptions of friends and family, to disprove their predictions, to find yourself in a free and accepting place, to discover joy in a world of knowledge and ideas, to believe that even you might contribute something—only to find yourself confined again by the unyielding walls of bureaucracy and the uninterested, sullen, cynical, suspicious, defiant, prematurely world-weary faces of thirty twelve-year-olds.
To remember, to share, to comfort, to huddle, to bow, to weep—to ache.
What a nice way to use an em dash: as an indicator to a summary. I don't know that I've used it this way before. I think it's been relegated to showing a jump in thought, or a jump away and back.