ThunderReaders

Victor Davis Hanson, a Stanford professor of classics, and author of a recent book about the wars between Athens and Sparta, has fun writing a political piece today exploring an amazing range of figures of speech to compare John McCain and Barack Obama. I just have to publish this for my “Writer of the Day” because of the variety and density of rhetorical devices he plays with in order to make some serious points.

How many different figures can you find in this piece?  Among the analytical terms we’ll study in our AP course, I can find examples of allusion, metaphor, simile, personification, antithesis, paradox, analogy, rhetoric, imagery, pathos, idiom, colloquialism, archetype…it just doesn’t stop!

Professor Hanson has given us a “keeper” that you’ll be able to master later on in our year! Enjoy it now, and comment on which figure of speech he uses you like the best.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/07/imagining_the_election.html

I’m sure that any of you checking out our blog is well underway in exploring the Opinion page of the New York Times.  I’m going to start posting my favorite piece of the day, just to start commenting on some of the distinctive “moves” busted by some of these distinguished writers.

You’re welcome to comment on the piece if you’ve read it or to post some of your own “WoDs.”

Today, hands down, is Jerry Seinfeld’s guest contribution about the great stand up comedian George Carlin, who died this week.  Carlin is undoubtedly one of the patron saints of our course on language and rhetoric, right up there with Cicero, Petrarch, Shakespeare, and the rest.  You’ll see why when we study euphemism. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/24/opinion/24seinfeld.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Here’s my favorite line of Seinfeld’s praise for Carlin:  “And he didn’t just “do” it. He worked over an idea like a diamond cutter with facets and angles and refractions of light. ” Hopefully, we’ll be learning to do with varieties of language a little bit of what George Carlin was able to do with his analyses of language, life, and ideas.