
Departing from the text
Many years ago, when our kids were little, they had an aunt (Ok, they still have that aunt, but they are no longer little) who loved to send them Berkeley Breathed Bloom County children's books. I will never forget a repetitive phrase used in one of them: “depart from the text.” In the book – I believe it's Goodnight Opus – Grandma falls asleep reading to little Opus, who then imagines a very different story than the one he was previously hearing – he “departs from the text.”