In the text ‘Between a Rock and a Hard Place’ how does the writer use language and

structure to create tension?

Ralston uses language to create tension with the simile ‘akin to climbing down from the roof of a
house.’ This creates tension because Ralston phrases as it if it should be an easy task, but in reality
its really difficult and potentially dangerous. He also uses direct speech, ‘get your hand out of there,’
which shows his desperation and panic as he’s talking to himself, and willing his hand to be freed.
Another language technique is the variety in punctation. This is shown when Ralston writes ‘time
dilates, as if I’m dreaming, and my reactions decelerate… …side of my forearm.’ These two sentences
use 7 commas, 3 semi-colons and one colon. The effect of this is that it slows the sentence down as
the sentence is broken up into so many parts, and this replicates the ‘time dilating.’ This builds up
the tension as you keep reading such a long sentence. He also builds up tension by using emotive
language such as ‘flaring agony.’ This phrase shows the extent of the pain the writer is going
through. The word ‘flaring’ had connotations to fire, building an extremely painful and burning
image in the reader’s head, and ‘agony’ shows how awful the pain is too.

Ralston also uses structural techniques to build tension, such as long complect sentences. For
example, ‘I’d give it even odds… …myself with brute force’ builds tension because you keep reading
once sentence without pausing for breaks. He also uses short sentences for example, ‘nothing.’ and
‘good god, my hand.’ ‘Nothing’ creates tension as it’s so short and abrupt the reader is shocked and
full of tension as to whether he will be able to free his hand. On top of this, Ralston uses incomplete
sentences such as ‘I’m frantic, and I cry out…’ This creates tension because it suggests he breaks off
his cry as he realises no one can hear him. It also reminds the reader that he’s in such terrible pain.