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puissance of assonance

For many years, boxes of my old books and papers have been waiting for me in the garage-studio next to my mom’s house. Since Stewart and I recently drove down to Missouri, the no-room-in-my-suitcase excuse no longer flew. One night during the visit I went through a folder of essays from my freshman composition course at Westminster. I found some truly purple responses to Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116. Here is my all time favorite: “In line twelve, the puissance of assonance thrills the reader with the sound of ‘even to the edge of doom.'” In case the word doom isn’t puissant enough, I helpfully explain that “the edge of doom is an eternal abyss, one which a spiritual union can conquer.” I did tone it down in the final draft, but where’s the fun in that?

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