brooklyn gal for a while

an excerpt

from Teacher Man by Frank McCourt:
"Sometimes [the principal would] slip in a word or two about the necessity of teaching diagramming and I'd promise to try it. . . I tried but failed. I made lines vertical, horizontal, slanting, and then I stood, adrift at the blackboard. . . [The principal] understood. . . He said some people just dont have it. . . Joe Curran certainly had it. Afterall, he was a graduate of Boston Latin. . . H could diagram in Greek and Latin and probably in French and German. Thats the kind of training you get at Boston Latin."

I like that passage for a couple of reasons. 1. My Dad was always upset with our school system because we never had to learn sentence diagraming, and he had to endure it, darn it, so we must as well. 2. I know a Joe Curran who probably can diagram in all those languages.

posted by gordian knot @ Friday, October 27, 2006