WRITING BETTER ENGLISH, WEEK 8

PERSUASION KEYS:

ETHOS – AUTHORITY, REPUTATION, ACHIEVEMENT, INSIGHT

LOGOS - REASON

PATHOS – EMOTION

 SOURCES:

- STRUNK AND WHITE, THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE

- EMERSON, “SELF-RELIANCE”

- FROST, POETRY, “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”

- THIS WEEK’S WRITING ASSIGNMENT: 150-250 WORDS ON FROST’S ”STOPPING BY WOODS ON A SNOWY EVENING.”

LAST WEEK’S WRITING ASSIGNMENT: 150-250 WORDS ON FROST’S “Paul’s Wife”

 

THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE, CONTINUED

IV. WORDS AND EXPRESSIONS COMMONLY MISUSED

Leave, let: "Let it alone."

Less, fewer: "More or less; many or fewer."

Like, as: prepositional phrase, clause

Loan (n), lend (v)

Partly, partially: a part of a whole, to a certain degree

Firstly, first; secondly, second…

I or we shall, you will, he or she will (1^st person future, 2^nd, 3^rd)

 

ESSAY, "SELF-RELIANCE," RALPH WALDO EMERSON

PENULTIMATE LINES from EIGHTH PARAGRAPH

There is a mortifying experience in particular, which does not fail to wreak itself also in the general history; I mean “the foolish face of praise,” the forced smile which we put on in company where we do not feel at ease, in answer to conversation which does not interest us.

NINTH PARAGRAPH

For non-conformity, the world whips you with its displeasure.

And therefore a man must know how to estimate a sour face.

The bystanders look askance on him in the public street or in the friend’s parlor.

If this aversion had its origin in contempt and resistance like his own he might well go home with a sad countenance; but the sour faces of the multitude, like their sweet faces, have no deep cause—disguise no god, but are put on and off as the wind blows and a newspaper directs.

Yet is the discontent of the multitude more formidable than that of the senate and the college.

It is easy enough for a firm man who knows the world to brook the rage of the cultivated classes.

Their rage is decorous and prudent, for they are timid, as being very vulnerable themselves.

But when to their feminine rage the indignation of the people is added, when the ignorant and the poor are aroused, when the unintelligent brute force that lies at the bottom of society is made to growl and mow, it needs the habit of magnanimity and religion to treat it godlike as a trifle of no concernment.

 

 

Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

 

 

REMINDER  / REVIEW

Chapter Titles from THE 7 HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE

Habit 1: Be Proactive
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Habit 3: Put First Things First
Habit 4: Think Win/Win
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood
Habit 6: Synergize
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

 

WRITING ASSIGNMENTS:

150-250 WORDS ON FROST’S ”STOPPING BY WOODS ON A SNOWY EVENING.”

douglas@tingandi.com

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