ABSTRACT
The quote is not from a play, but is the opening line from a story by the English novelist Elizabeth Taylor. It is a fine example of how a writer can use words to cast a bright new light on the mundane and familiar. An examination of the phrase – the placing of the words, the rhythm of the words, the punctuation – shows that the author constructed it with as much care as the composer of a piece of music placing the notes on the page. A brief description of a moment in time, it has no internal punctuation but rolls itself out along a sequence of lazy, open vowels towards the final full stop. The placing of ‘on’, ‘in’ and ‘in’ add to the tangible sense of time going on forever. For me, it is one of those phrases that puts into words something I have experienced (waiting on a deserted country station in the hot summer for the train that never comes) in a manner that sums up the essence of that experience. The writer’s individual voice, the value she placed on the words, gave verbal expression to a feeling I recognised, a thought I didn’t know I had.
