WRITING BETTER ENGLISH, WEEK 9

 

WRITING BETTER ENGLISH – PERSUASION:

ETHOS – AUTHORITY, REPUTATION, ACHIEVEMENT, INSIGHT

LOGOS – EVIDENCE, REASON

PATHOS – EMOTION

 

RESOURCES

- STRUNK AND WHITE, THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE

- Macbeth book

 

 

THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE, CONTINUED

IV. WORDS AND EXPRESSIONS COMMONLY MISUSED

Nice (best use: precise: “a nice distinction”)

Split infinitive (only to emphasize the adverb) “to quietly go”

Than (often ambiguous) “I am closer to my father than (to) my mother.”

 

That vs which: “that” is restrictive,

 “The plow that is broken is in the garage.”

“which” is not restrictive,

The plow, which is broken, is in the garage.”

 

 

ESSAY, "SELF-RELIANCE," RALPH WALDO EMERSON

TENTH TO FOURTEENTH PARAGRAPHS

The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them.

But why should you keep your head over your shoulder? Why drag about this monstrous corpse of your memory, lest you contradict somewhat you have stated in this or that public place?

Suppose you should contradict yourself; what then? It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bring the past for judgment into the thousand eyed present, and live ever in a new day.

Trust your emotion. In your metaphysics you have denied personality to the Deity, yet when the devout motions of the soul come, yield to them heart and life, though they should clothe God with shape and color. Leave your theory, as Joseph his coat in the hand of the harlot, and flee.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.

With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall.

Out upon your guarded lips! Sew them up with packthread, do. Else if you would be a man speak what you think to-day in words as hard as cannon balls, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day.

Ah, then, exclaim the aged ladies, you shall be sure to be misunderstood! Misunderstood! It is a right fool’s word. Is it so bad then to be misunderstood?

Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

 

 

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 ASSIGNMENT:

Macbeth book choice