I just read the short fiction by Elif Batuman in the January
23 New Yorker. I quite liked the story (first generation freshman college
student at Harvard), but two sentences stood out for me. "The cocktail
party was reproduced in miniature in Gary's eyeglasses." And "Such
names were unheard of in New Jersey, where everything was called Ridgefield,
Glen Ridge, Ridgewood, or Woodbridge."
That first
sentence is a transition, from the narrator's surprise to her reply. But I
can't help wondering how the author came up with
that image. "Gary's eyeglasses" play no other role in the story, and
the cocktail party is a cartoon being shown in an art seminar. How long did it
take for Batuman to come up with that image? What other images did she try out?
What made her choose this one over the others? Writers' questions.
The other
sentence just made me laugh. I know two women who once lived in one of those
New Jersey towns, Ridgewood or Ridgefield, I can never remember. They have long
since left, now residents of New York City, where they are much more
comfortable and happy.
-------------------------------------
It’s
Slice of Life Tuesday over at Two
Writing Teachers. Check out this encouraging and
enthusiastic writing community and their slices of life every Tuesday. And add
one of your own.
Great entry. I'm having trouble writing thin slices. I need to sharpen my focus and, like you, focus on single lines that I admire. Today in Bryan Stevenson's Just Mercy, this line stood out: The opposite of poverty is not wealth. The opposite of poverty is justice." Then, on a totally different plane, my father's doctor said this to him: It's trite, but true what it says on those t-shirts, 'The older I get, the better I was.'"
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I show up as humbleswede on the SOL site.
DeleteThose sentences you chose are also really good. "Just Mercy" is such a moving book. Hard to read, but true. And what your father's doctor said should be on a T-shirt.
DeleteSome authors just seem to have a knack for coming up with unique images. I know that I am not one of them.
ReplyDeleteI am not one of those authors either. Maybe that's why I notice the really good ones and wonder, how did the writer come up with that?
Delete