Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, June 10, 1993 TAG: 9306120012
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Beth Macy
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
To the letter-writer's credit, the letter was much more pleasant in tone than the tome I received a couple years ago from a retired English teacher when I accidentally -- and I SWEAR this was a typo -- wrote the name William Thoreau in a story, instead of his better-known counterpart, Henry David Thoreau.
What I'd done in a recent column wasn't so blatant, though. I started a sentence with the phrase "Like I said" instead of "As I said" -- breaking the old "As a person, like a tree" rule that had been hammered into this letter-writer in the fifth grade.
My excuse for the grammar faux pas: A personal column is supposed to be written in the tone of the writer, in the person's voice. And, like, I just can't fathom beginning a sentence with "As I said ... " Too stuffy, too John Houseman-esque.
This excuse would, no doubt, disappoint my essay-writing teacher, Hollins College writing guru and poet/novelist Richard Dillard, who's spent one hour every week with me for the past nine months critiquing my newspaper columns and trying to pound into my thick skull the difference between like and as. He put it best one week when he shook his head, threw my paper down on his messy desk and pronounced, "The language is going to hell on a stick."
Aside from being a stickler on the like/as issue, Dillard pretty much let me do my thing. Although he did offer this bit of advice our first session: Either tell readers something they haven't heard before, or describe what they already know -- the universal experience -- in a unique way. And never condescend.
He taught me lots more, of course, but he did it in the traditional Dillard way: goofily. (It's a real word; I checked.)
Which is one of his secrets to being such a successful writing teacher. He doesn't try to impose his own writing style, and he doesn't go for the overly serious too-cool-for-school crap that so many intellectual wannabes get caught up in.
Dillard simply jokes, pokes and prods the writing out of you -- in whatever style you see fit. To keep you from taking yourself too seriously, he keeps the mood light.
In keeping with that tradition, herewith is (some of) What I Learned This Year From/About Richard Dillard:
"Polyester is an invention from hell." Little-known fact: In cold weather, it contracts and clenches your leg hairs.
Dillard is a total sucker for pet sob stories. I once watched a grieving student ask him for an extension on her paper because her family cat in Connecticut had just died. He gave her a ITALIC month.
The -ING suffix softens verbs; avoid it.>
He doesn't believe in the slash 'em/trash 'em school of teaching. In his first year as a professor, a promising student poet turned in a poem that wasn't up to her usual standards. Dillard wrote the word "junk" at the top of her paper, and she never wrote another poem for his class. He still worries about that student.
He hates the phrase "white trash" and once refused to be in an anthology of the same name.
One percent Cortaid cures poison ivy.
His favorite parts of the newspaper are Hi & Lois and For Better or For Worse.
He actually sends in those credit card applications you get in the mail every day -- if the cards have good pictures on them. His favorite: a Visa featuring puffins.
A little-known "guy trick": In photographs the Beach Boys would cross their arms in front of their chests with their fists clenched behind their biceps -- to make their muscles look bigger.
He once demonstrated in his office how he gets his dog, Agnetta (named for an Abba singer), to play: He gets on the floor on all fours, sticks his tongue out and pants excitedly. (I tried this at home with Scooter, but he just yawned.)
A joke: Hamburger walks into a bar. Orders a margarita with salt. Bartender says: "I'm sorry. We don't serve food."
He thinks it would be a good idea to write a column using blanks, and let readers fill in the topics.
So you can see, Dillard and I got along quite well. I miss him already, and it's only been three weeks since school ended.
The weekend of graduation I got him to autograph a novel of his that I'd just bought, "The First Man on the Sun." In his inscription, he wrote, "With love and respect to my favorite columnist ... "
Sensing a Kodak moment, I rushed over to give him a hug for the nice words. At which point he shouted, "Yeah, but I hate columnists!"
Which is his goofy way of saying he meant what he wrote.
Like I said, sometimes it's best to keep things light.
Beth Macy, a features department staff writer, has the world's most tacky and embarrassing Visa card. It says in bright orange letters "POWER!" Her column runs Thursdays.
by CNB