So my friend Jean sent me this awesome book of poems. Lovely stuff, lovely friend. I love good poetry. So does Jean, which is why she’s my friend. She had it sent from a used book store because it’s out of print. Beyond sweet of her, to find me an out of print book.
So imagine if you will my dismay at seeing what an English major with a mechanical pencil did to this lovely book.
So, if you underline something, does it make it more profound? I say, no, it does not. I say it means someone in a tweed sport coat with leather patches on the elbows told you that the word rain was significant. So to accentuate the significance, you underline it. Why? It’s because that’s what English majors do…deconstruct and underline. Heaven forbid you just read a poem.
And hollow soldier is underlined twice because everything else was already underlined. So, riddle me this…if everything is underlined, why underline anything at all?
Pencils down, English majors. Take notes in a notebook, but keep your poking, prodding, deconstructing pencils out of my books. Do not write “foreshadowing of death” in the margins. Do not write rhetorical questions to yourself such as “sexual tension???” Do not, under any circumstances, write the word “hegemony.” Just…don’t…do…it. Break the grip and walk away.
Bemused, perplexed, and just a tiny bit annoyed,
Canoelover
I love it! This post is funny on so many levels. I am hoping that this is the first in a series of posts that begin with the title, “Pet Peeve” (you could even start a facebook chain letter).
One of my pastimes of late has been frequenting our local good will in search of new books to surprise to the little ‘uns. One of the best parts about buying books second hand is that you never know what someone scribbled in the margins or wrote as the dedication. I’ve absconded with more kids’ birthday books…
Ugh that’s annoying…It’s kind of along the same lines, but then again not really, of this huge peeve of my own: Unnecessary quotation marks.
Best illustrated here: http://www.unnecessaryquotes.com/
Erin, I need to wash my eyes out with soap. OW! My favorite is “Professionals.”
I’ll put that on my list of Pet Peeves. Along with people who use two fingers to make quotation marks. All the time.
Carrie, I don’t have that many pet peeves. I guess I have one pet peeve – stupidity combined with arrogance. That covers a lot, doesn’t it?
Is this what it’s like to be smart?
Remind me never to lend you a book. I’m a habitual margin scribbler and underline-r. You’ll have an aneurysm by page 5.
that’s why i use a highlighter – leaves the guess work out of it, 🙂