Analysis of Me Talk Pretty One Day

In the story "Me Talk Pretty One Day", David Sedaris doesn't provide any sort of clarity for the reader. The language is choppy and hard to follow. Sedaris's opening sentence is boring and it's not good way to draw in an audience. In the first paragraph, Sedaris includes an awful wordy run-on, "After paying my tuition, I was issued a student ID, which allows me a discounted entry fee at the movie theaters, puppet shows, and Festyland, a far-flung amusement park that advertises with billboards picturing a cartoon stegosaurus sitting in a canoe and eating what happens to be a ham sandwich"(1). I felt that I needed to include the entire sentence to show how many things are wrong. If Michael Harvey, author of The Nuts and Bolts of College Writing, read this he would instantly revise it. One thing Harvey may comment on is the incorrect usage of commas. Harvey suggests that commas allow for long, complex sentences that still make sense (52-53). The improper commas actually make it harder to read. Sedaris could clear up his writing here by deleting unnecessary words. Since the wordiness complicates the writing, it would be most effective to remove parts of his description.

One of the most recurring problems in Sedaris writing is the structure. In individual sentences the structure is disturbed by the excess and by the placement of words. There are too many words Serdaris includes that aren't needed. The writer's thoughts are also scattered which messes with the structure. In each paragraph the thoughts jump around, so its hard to truly grasp what is going on. The lack of structure leaves the story without any grace or flow. Harvey says that "An essay is made of passages, and a passage...involves motion" (39). The motion from passage to passage creates a smooth flow. One aspect of flow that I think Sedaris did well on is the use of consistent characters. The speaker is nervous for his French class and puzzled by his French teacher. The tone of the language teacher is sharp and assertive. Her tone says a lot about the type of person she may be. Her sarcastic reply to the first Anna made a straight-forward statement that she doesn't tolerate the minimal effort. After Anna says she isn't fond of mosquitoes, the teacher fires back with "How is it that we've been blessed with someone as unique and original as you? Tell us please"(Sedaris 2). The rhetorical question is her last way of saying "I couldn't care less".

The dialog throughout the story seems to follow no pattern. It seems like dialog is randomly inserted, just to see how it will work. The teacher says to him, "I hate you...I really, really hate you" (Sedaris 3). Those hateful phrases are a good example of the random placements of dialog. Harvey might suggest that Sedaris asks indirect questions. His direct question is too formal for the context of the question, "Why refer to Lady Crack Pipe or Good Sir Dishrag when these things could never live up to all that their sex implied"(3)?

Harvey says that the purpose of an ending is to summarize. Sedaris concludes his story well by briefly summarizing his final thoughts. The student is excited after successfully understanding a sentence in French. "It's a small step, nothing more, yet its rewards are intoxication and deceptive (Sedaris 5)". His pride in his success illustrates what he as overcome to get there.