"A. David Moody" wrote:
>
> Interesting points made and questions raised by Tim Romano, Carrol Cox and
> Tim Bray (under 'presentation' rubric).
>
> First, to get it out of the way: 'blind / blind as a bat / ear'  in canto 2.
> Cliche yes; but cliche recuperated, since bats see with their ears -- as
> blind Homer saw the sea-surge (which is both visual and auditory), and saw
> through the old men talk.
>
>

That, of course, was my point. Notice that the recuperation requires
stress thrown on to the first syllable of the line. It reoccurs in one
of the later cantos. And it wouldn't have worked had "blind as a bat"
_not_ been a cliche.

Carrol