In Dreaming By the Book , a path-breaking analysis of how novelists instruct us to form images in our minds as we read, Elaine Scarry devotes an entire chapter to stretching, folding and tilting. The exercise is this: In a dentist's office, what might stretch, fold, or tilt? Simply make a list of as many items as you can, and very briefly describe the way in which these stretch, fold or tilt. 1,2,3, GO! There is nothing good about the dentist's office. Absolutely nothing. You sit in the little waiting room while your ears are tortured with the sound of drills and crying children. They try to cover up the horror with cheesy muzak, but it can't possibly mask the sounds of pure evil going on behind the examining room doors. But that's not what this exercise is about. It's about stretching, folding and tilting... the scary chair, of course, folds and tilts the overhead light does all 3, and quite menacingly, I might add the mirror thingy that they stick in your