on the relationship of form to content: it is, eventually, the thought that counts

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and form is the arrangement of gates and gears that lets it. fishHowWriteSentence2012

[..] “Yesterday I saw a man electrocuted and it really was surprising how quiet he became.” Why are these imitations so lame, aside from the fact that I, not Swift, wrote them? It is because nothing is at stake; their subject matter is trivial; there is nothing behind them; they are little more than a trick. Swift’s sentence is certainly a trick, but it is dead serious; and behind it is a constellation of concerns about the Church, sectarian disputes, politics, education, literature, the ancients and the moderns, and much more. I know I said at the beginning of this book that it is not the thought that counts; but of course it is, ultimately. The forms on which I have placed so much ( justifiable) emphasis are there for a reason they do not themselves point to; they are there for the elaboration, illumination, and powerful expression of content.