Boyle Versus Ross
Greasy Lake was written by T. Coraghessan Boyle in 1985. Seven years later in 1992, a band by the name of Seven Mary Three was formed and the song "Water's Edge" was recorded. There are many similarities between the short story by Boyle and the song by the alternative "grunge" group. While there is no solid proof that Greasy Lake was the inspiration for their song, the band members have admitted that their college studies contributed to a lot of the material in their songs. Jason Ross, the group's lead singer and songwriter, was an English major in college with a minor in Creative Writing. Most of the songs that he has written for the albums were essays or poems done for college credit. (I have included a copy of the song lyrics so you may follow along if you are unfamiliar with the song), The song opens by describing, in detail, a dead body floating down by the water's edge. While Ross uses different actual words to describe the scene, the description is nevertheless similar to the protagonist's description of the dead body in Greasy Lake. He "stumbled back in horror and revulsion" upon discovering the dead body floating in the water. The second line from the song claims that "you can't stomach what y
in this short amount of time, however I am not sure if these feelings are genuine or if they are only there because of the situation it put him and his friends in. The last verse of the song conveys his feelings. This ain't no f***ing game, and I'm feeling so ashamed because I didn't do anything to stop this from happening". I don't think that the boy in Greasy Lake was ashamed at the fact that they almost committed rape, but more because he knew that had the headlights not stopped them, there was no telling what might have really happened. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The second verse of the song is similar as well because it implies that whoever discovered the body was not there when the person died. "No sound of fury, no shot of pain" is an implication that if there was a shot of pain or sound of fury, nobody was around to hear it. The protagonist in Greasy Lake has come to the conclusion on his own that the dead man floating in the water next to him was a bad character, shot in a drug deal or drowned in the lake because he was drunk. Either way, "there was no real reason" for him to be dead. I had a problem at first trying t
Some common words found in the essay are:
Greasy Lake, Creative Writing, Water's Edge, Jason Ross, greasy lake, Coraghessan Boyle, Seven Mary, dead body, water's edge, , greasy lake inspiration, verse song, jason ross, lake inspiration, shot pain, body floating, floating water, dead body floating, sound fury,
Approximate Word count = 805
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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