Re: health warning and RT

That sounds like a H.S. thing to me, Matthew, more than a college thing, although
I'm sure it depends on which college you attend. Will teaches composition and he
has a completely different emphasis. I've read some composition theory and it all
tended to be a bit wary of a purely "grammarian" approach. I had one very, very
bright student once who was sooooo uptight about following the rules she almost
couldn't write -- or, at least, it stressed her too much. I told her to lighten
up. I told her that her ideas were more important than perfect grammar and
documentation in early stages. I told her any good copy editor can fix
grammatical mistakes (she seldom had any), but no one could give her her own good
ideas -- those she has to find for herself.

Don't know if it helped much, but she got an A in my class :). One of maybe 2 or
3 that got an A. I hope that chilled her out a bit. She was a Princeton student
just taking a class or two at my college for whatever reason.

RE: the Royal Tennenbaums --

I thought Bill Murray did a pretty good job, but he didn't really seem to have
much of a part. He seemed like a stereotypical spineless academic/victim type
goofball. Okay, yeah, the scene where he lit up when the kid misplaced all his
blocks was a riot :).

Gwyneth Paltrow's character was sooooo repressed and depressed in just about every
way possible that it was hard to like her. She did well being completely flat.
But I thought she really shone in the tent scene. I think she did the best she
could with the part she was given...

What about Angelica Houston? I love her in just about everything I see her in.
This too.

Jim

"Matthew S. Mahoney" wrote:

> load of mahoney?
>
> and, while i dont wish to start another thread, my objection is a venting of
> frustration against a grading system where grammar is assigned as much worth
> as content. i think it is precisely that objectivity that lends itself to such
> "popularity" and frequency among writers or teachers-its easy to get identify,
> and thus easy to master-but how many younger writers or students do we all
> know who worry needlessly about grammatical rules instead of being encouraged
> to fulfill their creative potential? and while i certainly understand the
> enormous change in meaning given the subtle placing of commas, etc, the
> scrutiny of those rules as a whole disgusts me.
>
> >===== Original Message From Matt Kozusko <mkozusko@parallel.park.uga.edu>
> =====
> >"Matthew S. Mahoney" wrote:
> >
> >> other symptoms include: appreciating material for intrinsic value, not
> petty
> >> and arbitrary grammatical rules.
> >
> >Ah, the separation of form and content! We've been through this load of
> >mahoney before. Anyway, "intrinsic value" is surely more "arbitrary" a
> >matter than grammar, which at least approaches objectivity.
> >
> >--
> >Il n'y a pas de hors texte,
> >
> >Matt
> >-
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> " I would gladly trade all my friends for the company of children."
> -Albert Einstien
>
> Matthew S. Mahoney
> Station B 8209
> matthew.s.mahoney@vanderbilt.edu
>
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Received on Wed Sep 4 13:36:23 2002