内容正文:
How to write coherently ?
《A Dream of Red Mansions》
Cao Xueqin
Gao E
The end of the story did not echo (回应, 附和) the poems that foretold the destiny of several heroines, and there were some contradictory(矛盾的) details between the first 80 chapters and last 40. Besides, the style of writing (文笔文风) is also a bit different.
Coherence(一致性)counts most!
Talk about A Dream of Red Mansions
Reading comes first.
What should we read
in order to write coherently (一致地)?
3
The Water of Life
①It was one of the hottest days of the dry season. We had not seen rain in almost a month. The crops were dying. Cows had stopped giving milk. The creeks and streams were long gone back into the earth. It was a dry season that would bankrupt several farmers before it was through. Every day, my husband and his brothers would go about the tiring process of trying to get water to the farm. If we didn’t see some rain soon, we would lose everything.
②It was on this day that I learned the true lesson of sharing and witnessed the only miracle (奇迹) I have seen with my own eyes. I was in the kitchen making lunch for my husband and his brothers when I saw my six-year-old son, Billy, walking toward the woods. He wasn’t walking with the usual carefree abandon of a youth but with a serious purpose. I could only see his back. He was obviously walking with a great effort trying to be as still as possible. Minutes after he disappeared into the woods, he came running out again toward the house. I went back to make sandwiches, thinking that whatever task he had been doing was completed.
③Moments later, however, he was once again walking in that slow purposeful stride toward the woods. This activity went on for over an hour: walking carefully to the woods, and then running back to the house. Finally, my curiosity got the best of me. I crept out of the house and followed him on his journey.
④He was cupping both hands in front of him as he walked, very careful not to spill the water he held. Maybe two or t