Hatrack River Forum: The Longest Sentence I Even Wrote

This is topic The Longest Sentence I Even Wrote in forum Books, Films, Food and Culture at Hatrack River Forum.

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Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on May 07, 2005 11:20 AM:

For an asignment regarding "Lord of the Flies" and the symbol of "blood":

quote:
From a rather natural thing in life â€“ people, after all, do get cut, sore, and occasionally hurt or wounded â€“ which is the general opinion of the kids (and in most cases, the reader too) at the start of the book, Mr Golding is capable of subtly using the symbol [of blood] in dialogue and description as something which does not stand by itself: but rather it adds on to other objects and symbols in the book which are connected â€“ and only by analysing the book and making the connection be-tween the various things to which the symbol of blood is added clear, one can see how the sym-bol of blood stands behind the major plot of the book and the various opinions about it (lust, resentment, passive due to either its power or averaging out resentment and lust) are one of the fundamental pillars in the philosophy of the book; in this way, I think that Mr Golding was not only successful, but triumphant: not only did he use a symbol which is important, but he managed to get the general pretentious use of it (by the Ã¼bermÃ¤nchen â€˜dramaâ€™ writers who think itâ€™s all effective â€“ time after time â€“ to have blood, sex and vulgarity in books and films) to be forgotten due to his subtleness, and the general conception of what blood is and was has been changed due to the bookâ€™s course and the symbolâ€™s hidden and supplementary effect on what could be any other object or symbol in the book.

That was 259 words!

JH

[ May 07, 2005, 01:03 PM: Message edited by: Jonathan Howard ]

Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on May 07, 2005 11:23 AM:

The longest train I ever saw
Went down that Georgia line;
The engine passed at six o'clock,
The caboose went by at nine.

-"In the Pines"

Posted by Vadon (Member # 4561) on May 07, 2005 11:23 AM:

Wow, that sentence still works, but there are two or three places that would be good to put periods in. ^_^

Now, were you trying to write a long sentence? Or were you just writing it and it turned out this way?

Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on May 07, 2005 11:25 AM:

It doesn't actually work. There are a handful of grammar errors in it that are hidden by the use of parens.

Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on May 07, 2005 01:06 PM:

Okay, 20K hotshot! What's the problem, what exactly is wrong with my impotent grammar, and what on Earth are parens?

Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on May 07, 2005 01:08 PM:

parens = parentheses

In this case I think it refers to parenthetical clauses, too.

[ May 07, 2005, 01:18 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]

Posted by Eruve Nandiriel (Member # 5677) on May 07, 2005 01:19 PM:

Daniel Defoe is famous for writing really long sentances. I picked up "Robinson Crusoe" and randomly flipped to a spot in the book to see how bad it was. The spot I flipped to had a sentance that went for over 2 pages.

Posted by Annie (Member # 295) on May 07, 2005 01:25 PM:

It is not cool to truncate parentheticals. The world has enough jargon as it is.

Posted by Telperion the Silver (Member # 6074) on May 07, 2005 01:28 PM:

Mmmmmm... blood.

The great symbol of life!

Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on May 07, 2005 01:47 PM:

I'm doing a 15-20 page assignment altogether. What's the problem with the sentence's parentheses? I hope my brackets are okay!

[ May 07, 2005, 02:06 PM: Message edited by: Jonathan Howard ]

Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on May 07, 2005 01:50 PM:

They cause the paragraph to read choppy, and while they MAY be techinally correct, there are a ton of ways to phrase the same statements better.

Kwea

Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on May 07, 2005 01:56 PM:

First, lose the semicolon. There's no need for it. Make it a period and start with two sentences.

Look at your use of colons followed by conjunctions. It's generally unnecessary.

Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on May 07, 2005 02:14 PM:

quote:
They cause the paragraph to read choppy, and while they MAY be techinally correct, there are a ton of ways to phrase the same statements better.

But will they get me extra points? That is the question!

[ May 07, 2005, 02:16 PM: Message edited by: Jonathan Howard ]

Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on May 07, 2005 02:18 PM:

I would bleed all over that sentence if I were grading this paper. Almost everything individual thought can be broken into a separate sentence. The length and syntax makes it less clear and adds no value.

[ May 07, 2005, 02:19 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]

Posted by Goody Scrivener (Member # 6742) on May 07, 2005 02:22 PM:

Yeah, I'm having a hard time even following that sentence. I couldn't even begin to try and shred it apart for you at this point.

Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on May 07, 2005 02:48 PM:

Oh, but LAWYERS can do it all right!

Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on May 07, 2005 02:51 PM:

Yes, we can do it so that it's right. When you can do it right, we'll let you do it, too. [Smile]

Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on May 07, 2005 02:52 PM:

JH, they're trying to help you get a better grade. Listen to them. I got pulled down in HS all the time for my run-ons. If it can be broken into shorter, easier to read, individual sentences, it probably should, at least in formal writing.

Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on May 07, 2005 02:53 PM:

I would break it up into 259 sentences and see what kind of grade that gets you.

Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on May 07, 2005 03:29 PM:

I see... Too complex for the teacher... [Wink]

I'll let my dad review the whole thing. But at least I reached my first CORRECT very long sentence.

Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on May 07, 2005 03:38 PM:

It's not correct. And it's nothing to brag about.

Posted by FlyingCow (Member # 2150) on May 07, 2005 05:53 PM:

Yeah, it has a bunch of grammatical issues, as well as being spliced by so many parenthetical comments that its point is obscured.

Even if it were perfectly grammatically correct, it would still not be a good sentence, in the same way that the length of a book does not have any bearing on its quality.

Effective writing clearly communicates your point. This sentence obfuscated the point, concerning itself more with grammatical trickery than with clarity of thought.

This is not to say that proper grammar and syntax must be used to illustrate a point effectively, but even if this sentence did adhere strictly to the standard rules of written english, it would not be effective for the reasons stated above.

[ May 07, 2005, 05:54 PM: Message edited by: FlyingCow ]

Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on May 07, 2005 06:55 PM:

Were I an english teacher rather than a Grammar Communist, I would grade you up for providing a perfect example of how not to write a sentence. I would have it framed and hung up on my classroom wall, and point it out to incoming freshmen. "Just don't write like that idiot JH," I'd warn them, "and you'll pass my courses."

Since I am not, in fact, an English teacher, but only a humble Grammar Communist, your so-called sentence has no redeeming value whatsoever in my eyes. Ten years in the gulags, in a camp of harsh regime. And count yourself lucky I don't have you purged.

Brevity is not only the soul of wit, it's also the soul of comprehensability. Stop showing off and take a knife to the cursed thing.

Posted by tt&t (Member # 5600) on May 07, 2005 07:34 PM:

[ROFL]

Posted by ae (Member # 3291) on May 08, 2005 02:45 AM:

Please do not italicise the word 'subtly'.

Posted by jebus202 (Member # 2524) on May 08, 2005 06:20 AM:

Marry me, KoM.

Posted by Jonathan Howard (Member # 6934) on May 08, 2005 01:45 PM:

Ah, at least an attempt. It won't help me in law, will it?