I don't understand the story about Amy Tan. What is language?
Language
- Thread starter Josh Gonzalez
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...I don't have my copy at hand, could you please expound a bit on what you're confused by?.....
In the first chapter Stephen is struggling to justify writing a book on writing. He asks Amy Tan if there is any one question she was never asked during the Q and A that follows almost every writer's talk. She said no one ever asks about the language. He gives this exchange as the reason he wrote the book. So my question is: What is "language"?
I will consider a language to be a set (finite or infinite) of sentences, each finite in length and constructed out of a finite set of elements."
(Noam Chomsky, Syntactic Structures, 1957)
Language is a system for communicating. Written languages use symbols (that is, characters) to build words. The entire set of words is the language's vocabulary. The ways in which the words can be meaningfully combined is defined by the language's syntax and grammar. The actual meaning of words and combinations of words is defined by the language's semantics.
Thus On Writing gives one the tools to use "language".
(Noam Chomsky, Syntactic Structures, 1957)
Language is a system for communicating. Written languages use symbols (that is, characters) to build words. The entire set of words is the language's vocabulary. The ways in which the words can be meaningfully combined is defined by the language's syntax and grammar. The actual meaning of words and combinations of words is defined by the language's semantics.
Thus On Writing gives one the tools to use "language".
....I see that more of the writer's "voice", most stand-out writers like King have a particular "voice" or "language" in the way they deliver their stories....so much so, that you could probably pick up an unlabeled work by king and after a couple of minutes know beyond any doubt it was his product...hope that helps.....
I sure did - with my first Bachman book.
'Thinner' My sister told me to read it.
A couple of chapters in, probably less - I called her and said, "That's Stephen King."
It was the description of a convenience store sandwich.
She said, "I know it too" "Gotta be."
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Thinner definitely has the voice. No mistaking it.