This document provides an agenda for an EWRT 2 class. It includes a vocabulary test, reviewing rhetorical strategies like aphorisms and chiasmus, learning how to write introductions through directed summaries, and an in-class writing assignment applying these concepts. Students will also work on their essays and receive a review of character descriptions, prompts, theses, outlines, and using quotations in their writing.
2. AGENDA
• Vocabulary Test #3
• Review
• Rhetorical Strategy Aphorism, Chiasmus
• Writing Introductions: The Directed Summary
• In-Class Writing: Aphorism, Chiasmus, and The
Directed Summary
• Work on your essay!
4. Review
• Characteristics of your character
• Seven or eight different methods
• The prompt
• One of five: or you have blended two or more
• Working Thesis
• Outline
• Quotations
• An analogy or two
6. Aphorism
• An aphorism is a
saying—a concise
statement of a
principle—that has
been accepted as true.
• Familiar example
• “A penny saved is a
penny earned”
• There is no fool like an
old fool”
7. Aphorisms
•Such statements have important
qualities:
• The are pithy: they say a great deal in a
few words.
• They appear to contain wisdom: they
are delivered as truth and they have
the ring of other aphorisms we accept
as true.
8.
9.
10. Method One
• There is the ‘spontaneous combustion’ method, in
which the aphorism flares out fully formed at
unexpected moments, sending the writer scrabbling
for napkins, envelopes or any other scrap of paper on
which to write it down. Stanislaw Jerzy Lec was a
great practitioner of this method:
• No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.
Thanks to author and journalist James Geary for the information and examples of aphorisms:
http://www.jamesgeary.com/blog/how-to-write-an-aphorism/
11. Method Two
• Then there is the ‘deliberate composition’ method as
practiced by the likes of La Rochefoucauld. He would
attend a swanky salon, discuss all manner of subjects,
such as love and friendship, then retire for hours to his
room where he would produce several sheets of prose,
all of which he would eventually distill down to one or
two sharp, shining sentences:
• In the adversity of even our best friends we always find
something not wholly displeasing.
12. Method Three
• And then there are the ‘accidental aphorists,’
those writers who never intend to compose
aphorisms but just can’t help themselves—
aphorisms occur naturally within longer
stretches of text, such as essays, novels, or
poems. Ralph Waldo Emerson was a classic
accidental aphorist:
• What is a weed? A plant whose virtues have
yet to be discovered.
13. Rules to Consider
•keep it short (after all, only a fool
gives a speech in a burning house),
•definitive (no ifs, ands, or buts),
•philosophical (it should make you
think), and give it a twist.
14. Not fancy, just
thoughtful
• What is a bastard? A man whose birth right
overshadows his human rights.
• Bravery conquers fear; otherwise, it is
stupidity.
• If Arya cannot save herself, she cannot hope to
be saved.
15. Give it a try: Choose a word and write a short, pointed
statement expressing a truth, doctrine, or principle.
• Power • Bastard
Example: Marriage
• Execution • Winter
A lottery in which men
• Death • Brave
stake their liberty and women
• Betrayal • Fear their happiness.
-- Madame DiRieux
• Prostitution • Throne
• Hostage • Honor One long
conversation, checkered by
disputes. -- Robert
Louis Stevenson
16. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED)
defines chiasmus as, "A grammatical
figure by which the order of words
in one of two of parallel clauses is
inverted in the other.” This may
involve a repetition of the same
words ("Pleasure's a sin, and
sometimes sin's a pleasure" —
Byron) or just a reversed parallel
between two corresponding pairs
of ideas.
Chiasmus
17. •The word goes back to the ancient Greeks
and their fascination with language and
rhetoric. The "chi" comes from chi, the letter
"X" in the Greek alphabet. The word itself
comes from the Greek word
khiasmos, meaning "crossing." Khiasmos, in
turn, is derived from the Greek word
khiazein, meaning "to mark with an X."
18. Simple Grammatical
Chiasmus
A reversed order of the grammar in two or more clauses in a
sentence will yield a chiasmus.
Consider the example of a parallel sentence:
“He knowingly led and we blindly followed”
Inverting into chiasmus:
“He knowingly led and we followed blindly”
22. Try these two
• Parallelism: Arya trains Nymeria daily and plays
with her happily
• Parallelism: When Jon Snow arrives at the wall,
he seems happy enough, but when the arms
master treats him badly, he is frustrated and
angry.
23. Here are two possibilities
• Parallelism: Arya trains Nymeria daily and plays with
her happily
• Chiasmus: Arya trains Nymeria daily and happily plays
with her
• Parallelism: When Jon Snow arrives at the wall, he
seems happy enough, but when the arms master
treats him badly, he is frustrated and angry.
• Chiasmus: When Jon Snow arrives at the wall, he
seems happy enough, but he is frustrated and angry
when the arms master treats him badly.
24. Try it!
• Write a couple of sentences using chiasmus
instead of parallelism.
• Try writing new sentences.
• Look for some sentences in your writing that
will lend themselves to chiasmus.
25. • One of the most fascinating features of chiasmus is this
"marking with an X" notion. Take Mae West's signature
line, "It's not the men in my life, it's the life in my men."
By laying out the two clauses parallel to each other, it's
possible to draw two lines connecting the key words:
It's not the men in my life
X
it's the life in my men.
Thanks to author and psychologist Dr. Mardy Grothe for the information and
examples of chiasmus http://www.drmardy.com/chiasmus/definition.shtml
26. Word Reversal Chiasmus
Home is where the great are small
X
and the small are great
One should eat to live
X
not live to eat
27. The ABBA Method
One other interesting way to view chiastic quotes is the
ABBA method. Let's go back to the Mae West quote. If
you assign the letters A and B to the first appearance of
the key words and A' and B' (read "A prime" and "B
prime") to their second appearance, they follow what is
referred to as an ABBA pattern:
A It's not the men
B in my life
B' it's the life
A' in my men
28. Chiasmus can be achieved by reversing more
than two key words. This observation from the
18th century English writer, Charles Caleb
Colton, is a good example:
"How strange it is that we of the present day
are constantly praising
that past age which our fathers abused,
and as constantly abusing that present age,
which our children will praise.”
29. Word Reversal
Laid out schematically, it looks like this:
A How strange it is that we of the present day
are constantly praising
B that past age
C which our fathers abused,
C' and as constantly abusing
B' that present age,
A' which our children will praise
30. Another good example comes from
Genesis 9:6:
A Whoever sheds
B the blood
C of man
C' by man shall
B' his blood
A' be shed
31. Phrase Reversal
• "Lust is what makes you keep wanting to
do it,
even when you have no desire to be with
each other.
Love is what makes you keep wanting to be
with each other,
even when you have no desire to do it."
• — Judith Viorst
32. More Examples
• "We do not stop playing because we grow old;
we grow old because we stop playing." --
Benjamin Franklin
• "The absence of evidence is not the evidence of
absence." -- Carl Sagan
• “All for one and one for all” --Alexandre Dumas
• "I am stuck on Band-Aid, and Band-Aid's stuck on
me."
(advertising jingle for Band-Aid bandages)
33. Letter Reversal
• "A magician is a person who pulls rabbits
out of hats.
An experimental psychologist is a person
who pulls habits out of rats.”
• "a doe and fawn" hide from "their foe at
dawn."
34. Sound Reversal
•"I'd rather have a bottle in front
of me
Than a frontal lobotomy."
— Randy Hanzlick, title of song
35. Reversal of Homonyms
• "Why do we drive on a parkway
and park on a driveway?”
— Richard Lederer
• "Here's champagne for our real friends
and real pain for our sham friends.”
— Edwardian Toast
36. Number Reversal
• "A lawyer starts life giving $500 worth of law
for $5 and ends giving $5 worth for $500.”
— Benjamin H. Brewster
• "Errol Flynn died on a 70-foot boat with a 17-
year-old girl.
Walter has always wanted to go that way,
but he's going to settle for a 17-footer with a
70-year-old.
— Betsy Maxwell Cronkite, wife of Walter
Cronkite.
37. Review and Practice: Try to use words and
phrases that link to your character
• Word Reversal: One should eat to live not live to eat
• Phrase Reversal: Lust: keep wanting to do it, no desire to be with
each other: Love: keep wanting to be with each other, even when
you have no desire to do it.
• Letter Reversal: Rabbits out of hats: habits out of rats
• Sound Reversal: Bottle in front of me: frontal lobotomy
• Reversal of Homonyms: Drive on a parkway: park on a driveway
• Number Reversal: 70’ boat 17 year old girl: 17’ boat 70 year old
woman
39. Directed Summary
• A directed summary provides readers of your
paper with the information they need to
understand your argument and explanation.
• State the title and author of the literary work
near the beginning of the first
paragraph, perhaps in the first sentence. This is
essential so that the reader knows which work
you are discussing.
40. • Hook the reader. In the first sentences, write what is
particularly interesting about the work. This thought-
provoking information must also be relevant to the
topic you will discuss in your essay.
• Assume that the reader is familiar with the work
about which you are writing. Do not include too much
plot summary in the introduction or in the rest of the
essay. Do include the part of the story that will
support your thesis. This might or might not include
some aspect of your character description
41. • Use transitions throughout the introduction. Because
there are so many aspects of the work that have to be
included, the introduction can end up fragmented
and confusing. Make sure that it makes sense on its
own as a paragraph. Clearly transition from your
introduction into your thesis.
• State the thesis near the end of the introduction
(your introduction might be more than one
paragraph). The thesis should clearly state what the
essay will analyze/assert/argue and should be very
specific.
42. In-Class Writing
• Begin your directed summary.
• Consider what details you must include to
prepare the reader for your essay.
• Try funneling your introduction, that is,
narrowing your topic as you summarize the
relevant parts of the story. The thesis will be
the neck of the funnel and will direct the
reader to your specific argument.
43. Homework
• Read A Game of Thrones through page 700
• Post # 12: In-class writing: Examples of
aphorism and chiasmus
• Post #13: Directed summary introduction with
thesis statement. Include your outline with
quotations. Explain some of your quotations.
