Exercises de style
You know I mentioned a book by Raymond Queneau entitled Exercises de style? Well for practice in writing last week we had to do an exercise de style - basically to tell the story of a chap with a long neck and a hat with a cord round it on a bus, who complains that someone treads on his toe, then sits in an empty seat. Later he is seen once more ouside the station where his friend tells him to get another button sewn onto his coat. Yes - banal, bizarre, but fuel for a whole book and more...
Well I wrote in the style of a Marxist who keeps making exclamations. Basically I went to town a bit, threatening all the bus passengers with being shot and promising the chap with the hat that he'd be first against the wall when the revolution came.
I then spent all week worrying that I had gone too far. And the lecturer gave me 18/20! That's not possible. I even forgot that in French bullets are tiré and people are fusillé (I remembered at about 5am this morning), but still 18/20. I don't understand it at all.
Not that I am complaining! This week we had to translate some Montpassant from French to English, then swap passages with someone and translate the English back into French. It's good fun and it's all grist to the mill.
Well I wrote in the style of a Marxist who keeps making exclamations. Basically I went to town a bit, threatening all the bus passengers with being shot and promising the chap with the hat that he'd be first against the wall when the revolution came.
I then spent all week worrying that I had gone too far. And the lecturer gave me 18/20! That's not possible. I even forgot that in French bullets are tiré and people are fusillé (I remembered at about 5am this morning), but still 18/20. I don't understand it at all.
Not that I am complaining! This week we had to translate some Montpassant from French to English, then swap passages with someone and translate the English back into French. It's good fun and it's all grist to the mill.
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