I had the loveliest English lecture today that was worth waking up for. It was about punctuation! The lecturer gave us Miranda's opening speech from the Tempest without puncts and made us punct it ourselves. (ahh punct is a nice word. it's like, puncture. poof) There was this line that got me a bit stumped:
"...A brave vesselWho had no doubt some noble creature in herDashed all to pieces"
I didn't know whether to put dashes or parentheses in the second line. A brave vessel -/ who had...her -/ dashed all to pieces. OR A brave vessel/(who..her)/..pieces". Ahhh it was so nice and perplexing! I opted for the dashes, but the first original print of the Tempest had it in parentheses. Well at least I didn't just put a comma there. Thought it would be more than that.
But I mean, it's no right or wrong you know. That's why punctuation is so beautiful. I mean, it tells you when you slow down in a passage. It brings you to inflection, gives you cadence, brings MEANING to your text.. ah and I learnt how to take the space as a punctuation too :)
Ahh rewarding, though I slept at 430 the previous night and was bleary eyed the next morning. Liked the lecture muchly.
Vanessa Lim 2:59 p. m.