Friday, February 6, 2009

when in doubt, do a group sestina

This is an excerpt from Lorrie Moore's Anagrams. Sometimes I feel like this teacher. Having read this, planning to steal it as an in-class exercise, I know I'm this teacher.

"The six end words had been chosen by the students themselves: arm-hair, Spam, motor-cycle, plie, lounge, crash-helmet. The teacher wrote them on the board. The in-class assignment involved writing on a sheet of paper one line with the appropriate end-word and then passing it to the left. By the end of the period they would have twenty sestinas and everyone would have contributed. The members of the class were having a good time. The teacher could hear their giggles and their scribbling. It was a party game. It was ludicrous. It was the only way she knew how to teach."

1 comment:

Talia Reed said...

Thanks. I'm filing that one for April.