Craft Notes: “Three Songs of Salvage” by Eula Biss from Notes From No Man’s Land

a.      Techniques: Starts in the middle of a scene. Uses “the escalator” and “the Fifty-first Street station” opposed to “an escalator” (generic escalator). It gives immediacy and specificity to the opening image.

b.      Tone: Blunt. Recounts sad story after sad story, doesn’t reveal the connection between. “God bless you” repeated over and over. We don’t know how she feels about religion at the beginning. Admittive (saying sothing for the first time out loud feel) “And this is hard for me to admit”. “Born Again.”

c.       Structure: Numbered Sections. Different chapters starting with her experience and morphing to other family members. Section 2 in kind of a full flashback, but not really. It’s an abstract flashback.

d.      Important points, phrases: ‘I haven’t spoken yet,” describes an interesting fact that we seldom think about but always take part in: when do we say our first word each day? “God bless you, sweetheart”: we start to establish her feelings toward religion, as complex. “Obatala, is the father of both insanity and wisdom,” creating connections between the two. “Save” so many meanings.

e.      I will take the technique of creating immediacy by usinf “the” instead of “a” as articles. Also open-ended questions throughout. It’s intriguing and hinting.

f.        What does it mean?  I still feel ambiguous. She thinks we must be born again, but how does that apply to the specifics in her life? She feels new beginnings are good for us. New directions.