Sentence structure question
"Alan's office was as immaculate as ever, the man's expression every bit as opaque."
I really like the style of the latter part of the previous sentence: "the man's expression every bit as opaque" and would like to try and master it.
(To elaborate more, I particularly like how smooth it flows as opposed to "every bit of the man's expression as opaque", which is something I would normally tend to write.)
Can you throw more light on this structure using examples?
Thanks
Maybe you didn't understand the meaning.
"the man's expression every bit as opaque" and "every bit of the man's expression as opaque" do not mean the same thing. The first tells the degree of opaqueness and the second tells what portion of the expression was opaque. Another of saying ""the man's expression every bit as opaque", would be ""the man's expression just as opaque".
OK, just as opaque as what? The office???????
<<"Alan's office was as immaculate as ever, the man's expression every bit as opaque.">>
I don't think it's a good sentence at all. The author is equating "opaque" with "immaculate," which doesn't make sense.
I didn't read it how any of you read it. Perhaps I read it wrong, but I interpreted it as equivalent to:
"Alan's office was as immaculate as ever. The man's expression WAS every bit as opaque AS EVER."
...which would make sense. But it does seem ambiguous after reading the other posts. Since a few people read it differently, maybe it's not such a great style to copy.
>>I don't think it's a good sentence at all. The author is equating "opaque" with "immaculate," which doesn't make sense. <<
Precisely.
<<But it does seem ambiguous after reading the other posts. Since a few people read it differently, maybe it's not such a great style to copy.>>
Ambiguity can be quite effective in writing. It alows the reader to, essentially, inssert themselves or their perceptions into the text. Yet, as with everything, it has to be controlled. Too much ambiguity leaves the reader wandering with no direction.
This is also how I read it: "Alan's office was as immaculate as ever. The man's expression WAS every bit as opaque AS EVER."
<<I don't think it's a good sentence at all. The author is equating "opaque" with "immaculate," which doesn't make sense. <<
Precisely.>>
I don't think that the author is equating "immaculate" with "opaque". I think the author is using the office and the man's expression to give the reader an idea of his personality. The ever immaculate office and the inpenatrability of the man's expression conveys the idea that the man seems to lack human falibility. He is stark. A mistery of sorts, since neither his face nor his environment reveals much about him. And, conversely, this is quite revealing. He is trying to hide something.
There is nothing wrong with that sentence, nor are opaque and immaculate being compared to each other. The two things that are being compared are not the qualities themselves but the relative unchangingness of those qualities; the office remains immaculate as ever, and the man's expression remains as opaque as always, and it gives us an instant emotional insight into the man's personality without needing to spell it out more explicitly.
<<I really like the style of the latter part of the previous sentence: "the man's expression every bit as opaque" and would like to try and master it.
(To elaborate more, I particularly like how smooth it flows as opposed to "every bit of the man's expression as opaque", which is something I would normally tend to write.)
Can you throw more light on this structure using examples?
Thanks >>
This structure is similar to other comparative expressions -- you could substitute the "every bit as" with other comparatives like "just as", "a little less", "even more" etc., etc. The interesting thing about this clause is that the verb is actually in the first clause ("was") and is doing double duty in both without needing to be repeated. So if you ever write a sentence using that clause that stands alone you will have to insert the "was" in the appropriate spot, i.e. "The man's expression was every bit as opaque."
The structure is a combination of parallelism and ellipsis.
The "ellipsis" is the omission of "was" and "as ever" in the 2nd clause; they are implied from the first clause. This implication is possible because of the parallelism:
Alan's office ---------------- the man's expression
was ------------------------- [implied "was"]
as --------------------------- every bit [= "just"] as
immaculate ------------------ opaque
as ever ---------------------- [implied "as ever"]
The structure also sets up a sub-comparison between non-communicative immaculateness and non-communicative opaqueness.
I definitely read it as "as opaque as the office was immaculate". The writer is suggesting some commonality between being immaculate and being opaque. There's a suggestion that both are non-communicative, but also that there is a purity and non-specificity about both.
I see what you mean now, Guests, that immaculate and opaque are connected.
The tidy office offered no insight into the character of Alan, in the same way that his inscrutible facial expression offered nothing.
Parallelism: I'll remember that. Thanks :)
I am the same person as the first "Guest" in this thread and I agree with Uriel. That was my interpretation from the beginning. I thought it would have been obvious.