English Final The McGraw-Hill Reader employs an exceptional role at embellishing the array of deeper questioning and controversies that people will experience throughout their lives. Two of the pieces it contains, Once More to the Lake, by E.B. White; and Salvation, by Langston Hughes serve as prime examples of the anthology’s ability to highlight these greater questions of humanity. While both essays act as commentaries on important aspects of one’s life, E.B. White’s narrative, Once More to the Lake, presents a multifaceted theme and composition more superior than Hughes’ simple, lesson-imparting piece. Employing the rhetorical mode of narration and description, White illustrates and provides examples as he tells his story of revisiting a camp as an adult with his son where he and his own father vacationed in days past. White finds himself fighting an internal struggle between viewing the lake as he did when he was a young and viewing the camp as a grown adult, or through the eyes of his …show more content…
The poem aligns perfectly with White’s themes of appreciating one’s own life as it exists and remaining aware of death’s approach. White states, “I watched him [his son], his hard little body, skinny and bare, saw him wince slightly as he pulled around his vitals the small, soggy, icy garment. As he buckled the swollen belt suddenly my groin felt the chill of death” (237). At this moment, White glimpses the decay of his own life in his son’s liveliness. Clearly, the intimate and harrowing observations that White provides surpass the childhood experience of Hughes. Life and death provide meaning that any reader can relate to; however, Hughes topic of religion serves a less than universal role. Although their abilities to describe and narrate stand on similar grounds, White’s use of diction better embellishes the crucial message of his
My initial response to the poem was a deep sense of empathy. This indicated to me the way the man’s body was treated after he had passed. I felt sorry for him as the poet created the strong feeling that he had a lonely life. It told us how his body became a part of the land and how he added something to the land around him after he died.
In the essay “Once More to the Lake,” E.B. White, uses diction and syntax to reveal the main character’s attitude towards the lake in Maine. He has an uncertain attitude towards the lake throughout the essay because he is unsure of who he is between him and his son. On the ride there White, pondering, remembering old memories, keeps wondering if the lake is going to be the same warm place as it was when he was a kid. The lake is not just an ordinary lake to White, it’s a holy spot, a spot where he grew up every summer. “I wondered how time would have marred this unique, this holy spot-the coves and streams, the hills that the sun set behind, the camps and the paths behind the camps” (29). White’s diction and syntax
Authors often use details that evoke a response in readers to produce an effective description. Their aim is not simply to tell readers what something looks like but to show them. Katherine Anne Porter’s “The Grave” and E.B. White’s “Once More to the Lake” are essays that use subjective language to illustrate the principles of effective description. Porter’s “The Grave” describes a childish afternoon of rabbit hunting that brings death close enough to be seen and understood, while White’s “Once More tot he Lake” is a classic essay of persona; reminiscence in which he recreates the lakeside camp he visited with his son.
Within the essay “Once More to the Lake”, E.B. notes that “I bought myself a couple of bass hooks… returned to the lake… to revisit old haunts… When the others went swimming my son said he was going in… As he buckled the swollen belt, suddenly my groin left the chill of death (White 464). The essay “Once More to the Lake” brings a significant amount of attention towards the author’s attempt to secure personal satisfaction. It becomes quite obvious in the first few paragraphs, that the main character is on this vacation with his son, to recreate the careless feeling he use to have while vacationing with his dad as a child. Even though E.B. does not come out clearly and say it, the author is chasing some type of nostalgic feeling he clearly needs to feel better about life. On each page, White uses comparison and contrast to explain to the reader how the trip resembles the one he use to experience with his dad. By the end of the reading, the father begins to realize his vacation trip with his son will never be the same as the one he has dreamt about. He is no longer a child who can only notice the positive components of life. At this point, the father is an adult who will never have the innocence he once clung too. It takes some reflection for him to finally realize his place as a father in the situation. Comparison and contrast displays the idea that even though everything may look the same, it does not mean it feels the same. This mode rhetoric reflects back to the theme at the end of essay, as it concludes the author’s failed attempt to find some satisfaction from the
“...Put your pistol to your head and go to Fiddlers’ Green.” Throughout literary history, epic stories of heroes dying for their gods and their countries have called men to battle and romanticized death, but Langston Hughes approaches the subject in a different way. He addresses death as a concept throughout much of his work. From his allusions to the inevitability of death to his thoughts on the inherent injustice in death, the concept of human mortality is well addressed within his works. In Hughes’ classic work, “Poem to a Dead Soldier,” he describes death in quite unflattering terms as he profusely apologizes to a soldier sent to fight and die for his country.
Edward Taylor’s Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children and Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold are similar in their approach with the illustration of how beautiful and magnificent God’s creations are to humankind. However, each poem presents tragic misfortune, such as the death of his own children in Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children and the cold, enigmatic nature of human soul in Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold. Both poems create an intriguing correlation between earthly life and spiritual salvation while maintaining the element of how cruel reality can be. Both poems manifest a correlation between earthly life and spiritual salvation, which is how you react to the problems you face on Earth, determines your spiritual karma and the salvation that God has in store for you.
Yet throughout White’s essay you see how peaceful he keeps the tone the entire time. With the subtle approach White has on the parts of his memories he thoroughly explains to this audience. Look at the melodrama of the storm White uses. While in The Pond the tone is more spiritual and religious. For example in The Pond, Thoreau is using The Pond as a spiritual symbol. Then there is the dominant impression. In both The Ponds and Once More to the Lake they share something. The way they share their views. The views of the memories, environment around them, and the way they felt throughout the entire thing. Once More to the Lake is on the memories surround the lake White has always known of as a boy and that is his dominant
Once more to the lake by E. B, White is an easily readable piece and his diction is simplistic. His life story includes descriptionns and well explained imagery of white’s past and present memories which makes it easy to read and understand. In this piece, you can also see that the author is suceesful in creating an interesting and moving piece aboout memory. White’s theme is some how more illusive. In his retrospectio, you can see how he explains memories of how a son and father live the American dream, a vacation. Also, you can see how he uses short sentences to descripe his past and present memories. He also uses repetition to emphasize the feelings he his experiences at the lake. Recalling back on childhood memories, the author remember
I will discuss the similarities by which these poems explore themes of death and violence through the language, structure and imagery used. In some of the poems I will explore the characters’ motivation for targeting their anger and need to kill towards individuals they know personally whereas others take out their frustration on innocent strangers. On the other hand, the remaining poems I will consider view death in a completely different way by exploring the raw emotions that come with losing a loved one.
E. B. White's story "Once More to the Lake" is about a man who revisits a lake from his childhood to discover that his life has lost placidity. The man remembers his childhood as he remembers the lake; peaceful and still. Spending time at the lake as an adult has made the man realize that his life has become unsettling and restless, like the tides of the ocean. Having brought his son to this place of the past with him, the man makes inevitable comparisons between his own son and his childhood self, and between himself as an adult and the way he remembers his father from his childhood perspective. The man's experience at the lake with his son is the moment he discovers his own mortality.
Edward Taylor’s Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children and Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold are similar in their approach with the illustration of how beautiful and magnificent God’s creations are to humankind. However, each poem presents tragic misfortune, such as the death of his own children in Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children and the cold, enigmatic nature of human soul in Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold. Taylor’s poems create an element of how cruel reality can be, as well as manifest an errant correlation between earthly life and spiritual salvation, which is how you react to the problems you face on earth determines the salvation that God has in store for you.
...d present worlds. In the end, humans are subject to the universal cycle of life, in which birth begins one's life and death ends one's life. Elwyn Brooks White's essay represents place-based writing, in which it demonstrates a place of heritage (Holmes 66). White's essay is centered at a campground on a lake in Maine. This camp site represents "family heritage," in which he experiences valued memories (Holmes). The use of pathos or appeals to emotion demonstrates excitement of a well remembered place in which it "generates a type of connection" and "promise to the reader" (Holmes 68). Reflection of memories allows the narrator to understand his role and identity in the present (Radstone 135). Elwyn Brooks Whites successfully portrays the difficultly of accepting passage of life/ time, in which childhood memories are valued and cherished through place-based writing.
In “Once More to the Lake,” E.B. White expresses a sense of wonder when he revisits a place that has significant memories. Upon revisiting the lake he once knew so well, White realizes that even though things in his life have changed, namely he is now the father returning with his son, the lake still remains the same. Physically being back at the lake, White faces an internal process of comparing his memory of the lake as a child, to his experience with his son. Throughout this reflection, White efficiently uses imagery, repetition, and tone to enhance his essay.
At a glance, the poem seems simplistic – a detailed observance of nature followed by an invitation to wash a “dear friend’s” hair. Yet this short poem highlights Bishop’s best poetic qualities, including her deliberate choice in diction, and her emotional restraint. Bishop progresses along with the reader to unfold the feelings of both sadness and joy involved in loving a person that will eventually age and pass away. The poem focuses on the intersection of love and death, an intersection that goes beyond gender and sexuality to make a far-reaching statement about the nature of being
Critical Essays on Langston Hughes.