David
Sedaris’ Me Talk Pretty One Day is a capturing piece. But, even David Sedaris, an
accomplished, well-known writer, falls victim to “collegiate pompous style”
(Harvey 1). Many rules described in The Nuts and Bolts of College Writing by Michael Harvey were
abused by David Sedaris in Me Talk Pretty One Day. In a great majority of his
piece he is not concise and he uses commas incorrectly, But, at the same time,
he does an impeccable job incorporating punch lines into this humorous piece
and effectively using tricolon.
David Sedaris simply did not “use process of elimination” to “add
remarkable grace to [his] prose” and “make [his] prose easier to read and
understand” (Harvey 1). In merely the first paragraph he describes “Festyland” as
“a far-flung amusement park that advertises with billboards picturing a cartoon
stegosaurus sitting in a canoe and eating what appears to be a ham sandwich”
(Sedaris 11). This wordy description is in desperate need of “a hefty reduction
in the total number of words” (Harvey 4). Again, later in the piece, Sedaris
says “things they liked and disliked in this world” instead of simply
minimizing the number of words and saying “things they liked and disliked”
(12). This revision simply “[cuts] the fat” from an unnecessarily wordy
sentence (Harvey 9).
In Me
Talk Pretty One Day, Sedaris
faults with his use of commas. Repeatedly, he used a comma when connecting only
two phrases with “and”. He writes, “her rabbity mouth huffed for breath, and
she stared” when really he should say, “her rabbity mouth huffed for breath and
she stared” (Sedaris 12). Michael Harvey stresses using commas correctly for,
“defying today’s punctuation rules is perceived by readers as a sign of
ignorance or carelessness” (Harvey 34). He defies the rules yet again by using
an unnecessary comma to connect two phrases. Instead of saying “placed her
hands on the young woman’s desk and leaned close” he puts an awkward,
grammatically incorrect comma in-between “desk” and “and” (Sedaris 12).
On the other
hand, Sedaris does an impeccable job “[using] the punch line technique to set
up a joke, [or] to deliver a memorable phrase’ (Harvey 28). He has a way of
capturing the reader, even forcing them to crack a smile while reading his deviously
funny punch lines. Take for example one of the sassy lines of his peculiar teacher: “And do you love the little
war” (Sedaris 12)? Whether or not you detest the story or are captured by it,
it’s hard not to giggle. David Sedaris does a phenomenal job incorporating
humor, following Michael Harvey’s guidelines.
Tricolon appears numerous times throughout Me Talk Pretty One Day. This strategy of a list
compiled of three things “[tends to feel] balanced and complete” (Harvey 53).
David Sedaris uses this method almost everything he lists something. He writes
about Anna, the girl who, “worked as a seamstress, enjoyed quiet times with
friends, and hated the mosquito” (Sedaris 12). Describing things he himself
detests he said three things: “blood sausage, intestinal pates, brain pudding”
(Sedaris 13). And once again, when he tells things he loves he says, “IBM
typewriters, the French word for bruise, and my electric floor waxer” (Sedaris
13). All of these examples show how perfectly Sedaris incorporated the tricolon
method stressed in The Nuts and Bolts of College Writing.
Me
Talk Pretty One Day is
a perfect example of a piece of writing that follows the rules The Nuts of
Bolts of College Writing and disobeys them at the same time. The reader is
bound to crack a smile at David Sedaris’ punch lines but may find the placement
of commas awkward at the same time. His wordiness may be excessive at some
points but he does a perfect job with his lists. By the end, the reader will
turn the final page feeling quite satisfied.
