ESL General English Grammar Questions

Re: Need help with Wright again

CalifJim — Mon, 12 May 2008 17:34:29 GMT

Cadzao
Above all, integrity. The machine is [the] normal tool of our civilization, give it work that it can do well --- nothing is of greater importance. To do this will be to formulate new industrial ideas, sadly needed.

Tools, machines, buildings -- all must all be designed with their intended purpose in mind. (This was apparently not being done at the time this was written.) To design such things according to their purpose is to do something new in industry. This, unfortunately, is what is needed now.

Re: Need help with Wright again

Avangi — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:53:12 GMT

Sorry, Cadzao. It certainly is baffling. The first two paragraphs connect to each other, but the red one is definitely off the wall. It needs some kind of transition, or introduction. Even if he's attempting to draw some kind of parallel between houses and machines, you can't begin a new paragraph and a new idea with, "Above all, integrity." It would certainly make a good motto, perhaps in German.

Are you sure this isn't a collage of random quotes?

Good luck, - A.

Edit. If you look at the quote Marius posted, you'll notice that it flows freely between the remarks of a commentator and the remarks supposedly of Wright, with no attempt to mark which is which. If this is, as you say, an article by Wright, what are the words of this other guy doing in here??

Re: Need help with Wright again

Marius Hancu — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:51:56 GMT

You missed an article:

---

Above all, integrity. The machine is the normal tool of our civilization,
give it work that it can do well --- nothing is of greater
importance. To do this will be to formulate new industrial ideas,
sadly needed.

I think he makes an analogy between houses and machines. Give each house by your design a destination/job/work that it can perform well, not something which isn't appropriate for it. A robot/machine can't do more than what it's designed for.

Re: Need help with Wright again

Marius Hancu — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:43:43 GMT

Search for the text on the net and provide the links, pls:

http://online.chabotcollege.edu/shildreth/isls/2003program/wrightlinks.html

or better:

http://www.archive.org/stream/franklloydwright010191mbp/franklloydwright010191mbp_djvu.txtl

V. Bring out the nature of the materials, let their nature intimately into your scheme. 
Strip the wood of varnish and let it alone; stain it. Develop the natural texture of the 
plastering and stain it. Reveal the nature of the wood, plaster, brick or stone in your designs; 
they are all by nature friendly and beautiful. No architectural treatment can be really a 
matter of fine art when these truly natural characteristics are, or their essential nature is, 
outraged or neglected. 

VI. A house that has character stands a good chance of growing more valuable as it grows 
older while a house in the prevailing mode, whatever that mode may be, is soon out of 
fashion, stale, and unprofitable. 

Buildings like people must first be sincere, must be true and then withal as gracious and 
lovable as may be. 

Above all, integrity. The machine is the normal tool of our civilization; give it work that 
it can do well; nothing is of greater importance. To do this will be to formulate new indus- 
trial ideals, sadly needed. 

These propositions are chiefly interesting because for some strange reason they were novel 
when formulated in the face of conditions hostile to them and because the ideals they 
phrase have been practically embodied in the buildings that were built to live up to them. 
The buildings of recent years have not only been true to them, but are in many cases a 
further development of the simple propositions so positively stated then.

Re: Need help with Wright again

Cadzao — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:17:05 GMT

Hi Avangi,

I did not skip any paragraph between them. All of these paragraphs, including the red one, are from an article (written by Wright) in the Architectural Record which is reprinted in the book The Humanities In Contemporary Life (edited by Robert F. Davidson, Sarah Herndon, J. Russell Reaver, and William Ruff; published by Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc.; Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 60-6177).

Cadzao

Re: Need help with Wright again

Avangi — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:02:59 GMT

It sounds like you skipped at least one paragraph between your first two paragraphs and the red one. Give me at least a fighting chance!

Need help with Wright again

Cadzao — Mon, 12 May 2008 14:49:22 GMT

Frank L. Wright wrote:

"A house that has character stands a good chance of growing more valuable as it grows older while a hous in the prevailing mode, whatever that mode may be, is soon out of fashion, stale, and unprofitable."

"Buildings like people must first be sincere, must be true and then withal as gracious and loveable as may be."

"Above all, integrity. The machine is normal tool of our civilization, give it work that it can do well --- nothing is of greater importance. To do this will be to formulate new industrial ideas, sadly needed."

I don't get what the author means by the red paragraph. Would you please explain it?

Thank you.

Cadzao.