Word: florals
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...wardrobe should be able to outfit both sides of General Custers' Last Stand. Every yuppie's really a cowgirl at heart. Perfect garb for cow-tipping and shit-kicking: sandblasted jean jackets by Calvin Klein and long denim skirts studded with faux plastic by Christian Dior. Throw on some floral moccasins, beaded earrings, and fringed bell-bottoms for a dynamo ensemble good for the office, a hot date, or an afterschool powwow...
...drop off Maela; she giggles thanks, and in comes Belgis, about 40, pregnant, in a white frilly blouse and floral spandex leggings. She was waiting for three hours. She was visiting her family, and is on her way to Playa Yaguardabo to see her in-laws, 10 minutes up the road. We get there, and she's out. Condela stays put and seems perturbed--the back seat is not so big--when we welcome a young couple, Alexander and Yaineris, who bustle in, exhaling with relief. They have a chicken with them. A live chicken. Condela laughs at our surprise...
...with the tools of philosophy and cognitive psychology, as well as literary criticism. The mechanisms of imagination are the focus of the book. Scarry classifies the actions of literature within the imagination of the individual reader, identifying five main devices: radiant ignition, rarity, dyadic addition and subtraction, stretching and floral supposition. Scarry adds to this already esoteric and complex classification three chapters on aspects of repicturing, addressing circles, skating and "quickening with flowers...
...These are indeed beautiful descriptions of these activities--with terms like "radiant ignition" and "floral supposition," one might be tempted to accept Scarry's logic for the sake of its prettiness. Images of beauty dominate the book, from simple flowers to the grace of Achilles' movements to the gossamer-like qualities of Emma Bovary's apron strings and wisps of hair blowing in the wind. Even violence in literature can be pretty, if the author uses imaginative devices well...
...Scarry's ideas and floral vocabulary are more tempting than convincing. If she had presented her system as tentative rather than perfect and complete, if she had acknowledged the counter-arguments and reasons for hesitation, her argument would be easier to swallow...