Harvey’s
book, The Nuts and Bolts of College
Writing, explains many different aspects of writing that can be found in Sedaris’s
Me Talk Pretty One Day. Starting from
the opening sentence (Harvey 71), “At the age of forty-one, I am returning to
school,” we can see that right off the bat, Sedaris gives us an insight as to
where the story is going. In the next paragraph, the opening sentence doesn’t
just give a good idea of what is in that paragraph, but ties back to the first paragraph.
“I’ve moved to Paris…my school is an easy ten-minute walk away from my
apartment.” The second paragraph is
explaining more about where the story is taking place, and what the main
character’s situation is like. These opening sentences help strengthen Sedaris’s
story.
Not
only is Sedaris’s story organized, but it is “graceful” as well (Harvey 46).
Sedaris draws parallels (Harvey 50) in his work by comparing the misfit
character to “Pa Kettle trapped backstage after a fashion show.” Some other
examples of his parallelism are relating the foreign country experience where “it’s
everybody in the language pool, sink or swim,” and comparing the teacher to a “wild
animal, something completely unpredictable.” A specific type of parallelism, tricolon
(Harvey 53), is also exemplified in Me
Talk Pretty One Day. Lists of three such as “movie theaters, puppet shows,
and Festyland,” or “young attractive and well dressed,” reinforce effective
writing.
Good punctuation
is evident in Sedaris’s story as well. Dashes, colons, and commas are all used
in a way that helps dictate the story the way the author intended. The use of
the dash in this sentence, “I absorbed as much of her abuse as I could
understand, thinking –but not saying –that I find it ridiculous to assign a
gender to an inanimate object,” lets the writer return to the main flow as
quickly as he left it (Harvey 43). “I was determined to create some sort of
identity for myself: David, the hardworker, David the cut-up,” contains a colon
that organizes the passage into a neat list that supports strong writing
(Harvey 41).
I think
Sedaris does a great job of writing clearly and effectively. He introduces
ideas well, and also organizes those ideas in a way that the reader can follow.
In addition, Sedaris makes the story interesting by adding parallels and doesn’t
bog the essay down with extraneous ideas. Me
Talk Pretty One Day is a very well written story.
Vivian,
ReplyDeleteYou made many points in this blog that I didn't even think about! I definitely agree with you in the idea that Sedaris' story is "graceful". Reading the comparisons that you made in this paragraph furthered my understanding of why the text felt so easy to read. I also agree that Sedaris used good punctuation. I think this is also why is was so easy to read because it split up long sentences and paragraphs to made the text seem less boring. These are all good points that I didn't mention in my blog!
I agree, the punctuation makes the story easy to read. I think part of the reason it does so effectively is because Sedaris uses punctuation almost as if he were talking rather than writing. Interruption like the example you gave, Vivian, are very common in every day speech, but quite rare in formal writing. Sedaris's use of them makes his writing seem casual and informal, and also gives the piece a very unique tone.
ReplyDeleteI also think its a good point you brought up about the topic sentences. It's something that can be easily overlooked while reading unless you are specifically looking for it, but now that you called attention to it, I can see how Sedaris's topic sentences almost summarize the story if read successively, just as Harvey tells us they ought to.