“If one but tell a thing well,

it moves on with undying voice.”

Pindar was a famous poet of Ancient Greece who lived 522 - 443 B.C.E. Pindar often took Greek myths and made them into poems.  Some of his poems reflected victories that armies had achieved, but some of his poems attacked leaders who were power crazy (i.e., tyrants).  What’s especially interesting about Pindar is that many of his poems were read while musicians and dancers were performing - music that Pindar composed and dancing that he choreographed!  (Source:  Wikipedia)

I’m not certain what Pindar meant with to ‘tell a thing well,’ but maybe he was referring to the idea of telling something - an historic event, an imaginary story or a poem - in a memorable way so that it can be remembered long after it has been presented. Pindar’s words are still with us even after 2,500 years, so his ideas must have been expressed poetically in memorable ways.

Perhaps when Pindar referred to ‘undying voice,’ he was getting at the importance of what we call ‘writer’s voice.’  When we write narratives and essays, we try to establish our writer’s voice, not necessarily by using the word ‘I’ but rather by expressing ideas and information with particular vocabulary and phrasing that get across an attitude that we present in the writing piece.

Pindar’s quote actually sounds relevant in our age of technology because thanks to blogs and other on-line formats, our ideas could conceivably last as long as Pindar’s - if there is quality to what we express and our writer’s voice connects with the reader.

Back in June, I was excited about going to soccer camp with my friends.  However, at the last moment, my parents announced that the family would be going on a scuba diving trip. I didn’t like that idea at all. I wanted to be with my friends, and I wasn’t crazy about hanging out with a lot of sea creatures!  Would this be my worst vacation of all time?

While doing this memoir, I got valuable feedback from my peer partner who suggested that I emphasize the challenge I faced underwater and the family bonding that took place.  I kept that in mind as the purpose of my memoir. I also realized that I needed to add stronger vocabulary, so I used the thesaurus at Word.

You can read my memoir here.

In 2006, there was a contest for people to create their memoirs, all in six words!

Now that you have been working on your memoir, try your hand at doing a new version of what you wrote, but in 6 words!

Submit your 6-word memoir at the comments link for this post. We’ll have some judges decide which 6-word memoirs win prizes!

Here are some examples that were submitted in the 2006 contest for 6-word memoirs, as seen in an edited YouTube video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

What are your thoughts about starting off at school this year in Grade 8?

How does it feel to be the ’seniors of Middle School?’

What’s it been like to meet up with old friends?

Did you actually make any new friends so soon?  How?

Share your ideas by submitting comments at this post.

(A good idea whenever you submit comments is to type out your ideas in a Word document. Check for spelling and grammar, then copy and paste into the text window.)

Here’s a  video that might connect with your feelings about reuniting with familiar faces and having new experiences as well:

Click here to view the embedded video.