One of the exercises I like to do with rhetoric students is to have them imitate sentence patterns. For this exercise, we take sentences or group of sentences and break them into their various clauses and phrases, then we write a new sentence that uses the same structures and order to express entirely different ideas.
Many times, we take these models from the grand speeches we're analyzing, other times (as will soon be evident) we adopt prose that, if somewhat more lighthearted, is at least very well known. In fact, the following adaptation (by one of my lovely seniors) is based on a passage so familiar, I think I shan't post the original.
Piglet, friendship is the most important thing in the 100 Acre Wood-- except for eating honey: ooey, gooey, and golden, where the honey is fresh and the bees are angry, it's amazing, so good-- but that's not what was talking about; I was talking about having friends, and as we all know, to have friends is to be happy.
The original?
5 comments:
I give up, Oh!, do tell!
O.K. so maybe not the most well known allusion in OGBB circles, but when I grew up, if you couldn't quote at least twenty consecutive minutes of material from The Princess Bride you simply had no culture.
Sonny, true love is the greatest thing in the world. Except for a nice MLT, a mutton, lettuce and tomato sandwich, where the mutton is nice and lean and the tomato is ripe. They're so perky, I love that. But that's not what he said. He distinctly said "to blave." And, as we all know, "to blave" means "to bluff."
oh.
I can't believe I didn't get that! I love that movie. I didn't think about it very much, but I still should have recognized it. :)
I remembr doing that!
-Cameron
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