Lusus Naturae by Margaret Atwood Essays

Lusus Naturae by Margaret Atwood Essays Lusus Naturae by Margaret Atwood Paper Lusus Naturae by Margaret Atwood Paper Lusus Naturae is about a young girl, who around when she was seven, began morphing into a beastly freak of nature. The condition left her with yellow eyes, pink teeth, red fingernails, and long dark fur. She drank blood and her voice translated words to growls. Being a freak, she became a burden to her family who was doing well before she underwent these changes. To protect her and to clear their name from being the household with the beast girl, they faked her death but kept her locked in her room. She â€Å"died† in a saintly way, covered in white and praised for dying a virgin. After her death, her sister was able to get married and her mother stayed home to take care of her. Being thought of as dead, she found peace and solitude especially at night when she was able to roam freely. She found excitement in scaring children and people in windows. She was not bitter about being an embarrassment or â€Å"curse† on her family. She was very cooperative and gracefully followed through with the plans so far. Eventually, her father and grandmother died and her mother moved in with her sister’s family. A new family moved into her house, but she quickly scared them out and lived there on her own. Her secret life came to an end when she witnessed a couple having an affair in a meadow. Ignorant to what was happening, she became curious and wanted to join in. After the girl had left, she approached the sleeping man and bit him on the neck. She had meant for it to be a kiss. The village heard about it, inspected her empty coffin, and came after her. She decided to kill herself before they could get their hands on her. She planned to put on her white veils and throw herself off of her burning rooftop. While on the run she fantasizes about what she’ll be thought of as after she dies and what she’ll look like in heaven. She thinks of how great it would be if she and the angels looked the same. This story well illustrates what it is like to b

Inflections in English

Inflections in English Inflections in English Inflections in English By Maeve Maddox Inflections are word elements that indicate grammatical relationships among the words in a sentence. For example, the verb walked is in the past tense; we know this because of the inflectional ending -ed. The noun girls is plural. We know this because of the s that has been added to the singular word girl. All languages make use of inflections. Those that make use of a great many inflections–like Latin–are called â€Å"synthetic languages.† Those that do not have so many–like English–are called â€Å"analytic languages.† The low incidence of inflections in English requires speakers to pay attention to word order. In Latin, on the other hand, word order hardly matters. Take nouns as an example. In Latin, nouns have special forms, according to whether the noun is being used as the subject of a sentence, the direct object, the indirect object, a complement, a noun with a built-in preposition, a possessive noun, or a noun of address. In English, except for possession and number, a noun is a noun is a noun. If we look at the English word girl out of the context of a sentence, we know it’s a noun, but we can’t tell anything else about its grammatical function until it is used in a sentence. If we look at the Latin noun puellam (girl), we know that it is the direct object form. The form puella is a subject form. Puellae is genitive (possessive) form meaning â€Å"of the girl.† Because the inflections are â€Å"built in,† their order in a sentence doesn’t much matter. In English, however, word order tells us if a noun is a subject or an object. If it comes before the verb (usually) a noun is a subject. If it comes after an action verb, it’s an object. For example, in English, â€Å"The boy loves the girl† means something different from â€Å"The girl loves the boy.† In Latin, on the other hand, Puer puellam amat, Puellam puer amat, and Amat puellam puer all mean the same thing: â€Å"The boy loves the girl.† Then there are the adjectives. Latin adjectives have to accord with the nouns. To say, â€Å"The big boy loves the pretty girl† you write: Puer magnus puellam bellam amat. To write, â€Å"The pretty girl loves the big boy,† you can leave the words in the same order, but you have to change the endings to show function and gender: Puella bella puerum magnum amat. Because English retains so few inflections, it is a little surprising that so many of the errors we discuss on this site have to do with the few inflections that do remain. Nouns Nouns are inflected by the addition of an apostrophe to show possession: The boy’s backpack was stolen. (singular noun, ’s) The boys’ backpacks were stolen. (plural noun, s’). The letter s is usually added to a noun to form the plural: The girl climbed Mount Everest. The girls climbed Mount Everest. Errors with plural nouns occur with words that do not form the plural by adding s, for example, woman/women; calf/calves, etc. Errors in placing the apostrophe are quite common. For example: â€Å"The mens’ locker room† instead of â€Å"the men’s locker room.† Some uncertain writers sprinkle apostrophes in very unlikely places: Chloe sing’s with the choir. (Should be sings) The dog hurt it’s paw. (Should be its paw) Verbs Regular verbs are inflected to show past tense by adding the suffix -ed: talk, talked, (have) talked. Errors occur with verbs that indicate past tense by changes in spelling, for example, write, wrote, (have) written. See the DWT post Beware of the Irregular Past Participle. Pronouns Because pronouns have retained more inflected forms than nouns, they are the source of probably half the grammatical errors made by native speakers. The inflections that give trouble with the personal pronouns are these: Subject forms: I, he, she, we, they Object forms: me, him, her, us, them For more on pronoun case, see All Pronoun Cases Are Created Equal. Possessive forms are of two kinds: those that stand for a noun (possessive pronouns), and those that stand before a noun to show possession (possessive adjectives). Possessive pronouns: mine, yours, his, hers, ours, theirs Possessive adjectives: my, your, his, her, its, our, their For example, That book is mine. (Possessive pronoun standing for book) That is my book. (Possessive adjective qualifying book) The pronouns you and it present no problems because they are the same in both their subject and object forms. Other errors with the possessive forms are misspelling its and using their with a singular antecedent: Wrong: The house is having it’s roof replaced. Correct: The house is having its roof replaced. Wrong: Every scout will do their duty. Correct: Every scout will do his duty. Adjectives Adjectives are inflected to show comparison. This article illustrates the different ways of doing it: Comparative Forms of Adjectives Adverbs Adverbs are also inflected to show comparison. Adverbs that end in -ly are inflected by adding more and most in front of them: happily, more happily, most happily. Note: Some authorities regard the comparison of adjectives and adverbs as word formation rather than inflection. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Grammar 101 category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Addressing A Letter to Two PeopleFor Sale vs. On SaleDrama vs. Melodrama