Re: Ask Carl

[Carl Glover <glover@msmary.edu>]

Dear Thomas,
	No, it is not a chiasmus, although that is an excellent guess.
The difference between an antimetabole and a chiasmus splits the hair in
this way.  Both the antimetabole and the chiasmus involve crossing
patterns (hence the "chi" in chiasums is from the Greek that resembles our
letter X), but in the chiasmus, while it is a reversal of grammatical
structures in successive phrases or clauses, it does not involve a
repetition of the words.  For example, "It is hard to write it, but to
read it is easy" is a chiasmus.  The grmmatical structures run in reverse,
but the words are not repeated.

	If you really want to see some sophisticated chiasmi, take a look
at the "Encomium of Helen" by the sophist Gorgias, from the 5th century
BC.  It is simply loaded with them.  While they are easier to pick out in
Greek, you can also find them in the English translations.

I would consider this a Gorgianic chiasmus:  "But if it is a disease of
human origin and a fault of the soul, it should not be blamed as a sin,
but regarded as an affliction."  While I think the Greek text would more
closely mirror Corbett's definition of chiasmus, the English rendering
suggests chiasmus in that "disease" and "affliction" are linked on the
outside and "sin" and "affliction" are joined in the middle and are in a
sense crossed by "sin" and "affliction."  (Don't you hate when that
happens.)  Put another way, the chiasmus forms a kind of ABBA pattern.

Here's a chiasmus that one of my frosh wrote on an essay, her first.  She
had no idea what a chiasmus is, which, of course, enabled her to write one
quite unintentionally.
	"I do not receive any grades for how I perform in society, but how
I feel about myself in society is the best measure of what I have
learned."  
	Certainly impressed me.

	NOTE TO LYNNELL EDWARDS, my erstwhile Univerity of Louisville
colleague, who just signed onto WCenter: We don't normally talk about
stuff like this on WCenter.  We generally talk about tutor training
manuals, software, and such.  Don't let these tropes run you off.
					Warm regards,


					Carl W. Glover
					glover@msmary.edu

On Thu, 14 Nov 1996, Thomas Burkdall wrote:

> To all who may receive--
> 
>         Isn't it chiasmus?
> 
>         The message certainly isn't romantic.
> 
> 
> Tom Burkdall
> Center for Teaching & Learning
> Occidental College
> 
> At 12:51 PM 11/14/96 -0600, you wrote:
> >Our list might be dead, but we're always ready for one of these 
> >questions: 
> >
> >Last summer Alice Gillam was in Alaska for a vacation.  She said that the
> >ratio of men to women is really high, and that there are mugs and T-shirts
> >and postcards that say, "The odds are good, but the goods are odd." 
> >
> >What figure of speech is that?  
> >
> >Paula Gillespie
> >Marquette University
> >
> >
> 
>