Oct
6
6
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
—F. Scott Fitzgerald, from The Great Gatsby
About
Poets think in lines, prose writers in sentences; the best of both work from sound to sense, with an ear for the music in their compositions. S for Sentence celebrates lyricism in prose, the play and craft at work in the artful sentence. We post a sentence a month along with comments by a guest writer on the craft that shapes it, on what makes it great. In one or two sentences.—Pearl Abraham, Editor
This concluding sentence of the famous novel transformed me, a 16 year old with slouching interest in books, into an avid reader. I could read it aloud, without attending to the meaning, and feel as if the words themselves were little musical boats bobbing on an undulating current. Mesmerized, I wondered what would happen if we stopped beating on, and just allowed ourselves to be borne back, and by what?
—John Hughes, author of Crossing Rivers
—John Hughes, author of Crossing Rivers