Sunday, March 15, 2009

Week 3 Blog

In Falling Leaves the best used technique is most definately how Adeline Yen Mah shows insteads of tells, much like McCarthy. Her use of this technique is shown here. "Early photographs show a solemn girl with clenched fists, pressed lips and serious eyes, dressed in pretty western frocks decorated with ribbons and bows." (ch 5, pg 34). The ways she describes herself as a very uptight and grumpy child is very good. She doesn't just say like early photos show a serious grumpy child in western clothing. Instead Adeline describes everything. This inclluding her serious eyes, her clenched fists, and pressed lips. This is also showed in this quote. "I remembered her as a quick-witted and strong-willed chain smoker with bound feet, short hair and a razor-sharp tongue." (ch 1, pg 11). The way she says razor-sharp tongue and all of the other descriptions really helps you imagine what's going on. Adeline Yen Mah's way of writing really helps people imagine things in their heads, which I guess would also be imagery then as well. Her descriptive words are key to her style. That concludes week 3.

3 comments:

  1. It must be cool reading something that sounds like McCarthy again.

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  2. Kind of. I do like McCarthy's style of showing and not telling, but there are some other aspects I didn't really enjoy. Such as his short sentances. After a while his style of sentances got really boring.

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  3. From what you've described, it seems as if the author of Falling Leaves uses figurative language to help the reader visualize, and relate to the characters in the novel. In Tears of the Desert, I feel as if imagery is used more to describe the setting, and the culture in Sudan.
    It's interesting to see how different authors used the same figurative language to emphasize different things in their novels.

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