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From: Jack Hamilton <jfh@acm.org>
Newsgroups: alt.languages.english
Subject: Re: does this sentence make sense?
Date: Mon, 31 May 2004 22:58:29 -0700
Organization: Copyright (c) 2004 by Jack Hamilton. Reproduction without attribution, and archiving without permission, are not allowed.
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sdhelweg@hotmail.com (nimbus) wrote:
>Hi
>
>I need feedback from someone whose native language is english. I wrote
>a song inspired by The Great Novel "The Great Gatsby". But - the song
>begins with a line, that I'm not sure makes (even poetic) sense in
>english. It goes like this:
>
>"I piled my charms to the second floor"
>
>Is this interpretable? And if it is, how would you interpret it?
You're making a concrete object (something pilable) out of an abstract
concept (charms). That's OK in poetry, of course.
"Piled" is often used with dense objects, such as bags of cement or
coins, so for me there's a bit of conflict between "piled" (heavy) and
charms (light). Perhaps that's what you intend.
Also, "to the second floor" seems a bit odd. Why the second floor,
which doesn't seem that high (10 feet off the ground)? If you're trying
to convey a sense of exaggeration, or even of giddiness, "to the 20th
floor", or some other large number, might work better. To the second
floor? Either your charms are pretty flat, or you don't have many of
them.
==
Jack Hamilton
jfh@acm.org
==
In the end, more than they wanted freedom, they wanted comfort and security.
And in the end, they lost it all - freedom, comfort and security.
Edward Gibbons
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