Vorkosigan

Thanks for those great notes, Toto! I wish I had been there!

Ted Hoffman

This is a hypertext written via literary borrowing from my post, the hypotext. I am literary genius .

Vorkosigan

It's actually a chiasm centering around the identity of a powerful, semi-mythical figure.

A: Thanks for the Notes
B: Toto
A: Wish I had been there

Ted Hoffman

Yes, this is indeed a chiasm. The chiasms both start with an expression of gratitude (thanks), and end with a reference to a place (There). These two expressions sandwich the semi-mythical figure (Toto). Tightly :love: .

In addition, you can recognize Ted's hand when you see the use of few words. Vork uses 11 words while Ted uses 9 words to say the same thing. Whereas VorK writes "I had been", Ted writes "I was".

Ladies and gentlemen, what we are beholding here is a lexical expression of the deep sense of economy that pervades the African mindset. There is a tension between this sense of parsimony, which has found textual expression in the post by Ted, and the sense of flamboyance as we see in Ted's choice of words. For example, Ted uses the word "rundown" which is heavier compared to Vork's "notes", which is simpler, leaner and less subject to multiple meanings. "Rundown" can mean broken down, a point-by-point summary, or have connotations of conquest etc.

And did I mention that "rundown" is also used in baseball to mean something else?
I should have.

Like I said, I am a literary genius .

Edited to change 'hard' to 'hand'.