Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Effect of literature on culture
The construction of the hero in literature
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: Effect of literature on culture
What subjects do you enjoy reading about? If you’re like me, you might enjoy learning about science, religion, and history. If not, there are countless other subjects and even more opinions on each subject. The choice is an important one. The things you learn while reading non-fiction could influence your life in ways you don’t expect. Literature has the power to sway opinions, votes, and even career paths. Non-fiction is often regarded as being boring by some of my peers, but I find that reading for the purpose of learning is often more entertaining than watching television or playing video games. It is certainly far more rewarding. I began reading educational books when I was seven. My parents bought me a couple of books about dinosaurs after I expressed some interest in them. By the time I …show more content…
He has been the single most influential and interesting author I’ve had the pleasure of reading. I find it ironic that he’s my favorite author because one of the lessons I learned from his books is the importance of questioning your heroes. It would be silly to blindly follow an old fool just because he said a few things you agree with. Mr. Hitchens has always survived my questioning because of his demand for total journalistic honesty and integrity, a demand that he rigorously applied to his own writing. His infamous bestseller “god is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything” was highly influential on me after I’d abandoned Christianity. It provided a perspective that was new to me at the time, and served as a stepping stone in my continuing analysis of religion. His autobiography vividly depicts his life from his birth in post-WWII Britain to the fateful day he was diagnosed with esophageal cancer, which led to his death in 2011. If I ever decide to write my own memoirs, I’ll be sure to include a statement describing the influence of his writing during these seminal years of
When you read, especially fiction, you experience a broad sweep of human life. You gain access to the thoughts of others, look at history through another person’s eyes and learn from their mistakes, something that you otherwise would not be able to experience.
My parents have always stressed the importance of reading. Throughout my whole life, they have motivated me to read and they have encouraged me to find books that I find interesting to read. Because of their encouragement, I am an avid reader today. When I was a child, just starting to enjoy reading I liked to read books that were fiction. Some of my favorite books to read as a child are series that I still love today and I think I still have every book in each series stored in my attic. They are The Boxcar Children, Junie B. Jones, and The Magic Tree House.
Instead of mom reading children’s books to me, I read them to her. And if I stumbled upon something I didn’t know or understand, mom helped me out! Soon enough I started reading to her without stuttering of not knowing how to say a word. I started being able to sound out words easier and my fluency became much better than before. First grade came around and I started reading bigger books such as Junie B. Jones and also the Magic Treehouse books. Books became easier to read as I aged and the books I read were getting bigger and bigger. In 5th and 6th grade I read The Red Pyramid, The Throne of Fire, and The Serpents Shadow, a trilogy called The Kane Chronicles written by Rick Riordan. I thought these three books were the greatest three books ever written! I even thought they were better than the hunger games! Especially with the series being based around Egyptian gods and theology, and also managed to tie in kids around my age that I could relate to. Those books made me love reading more than I ever have and I would read them again if I had the time to. Once 8th grade came out along I decided to read a “big boy” book: DaVinci Code by Dan Brown. I thought I was so cool because I was reading a book that my parents have read. It has been the best book I have yet to read so far because it sparked my interest from the first sentence, to the last, there was intense suspense throughout the whole book and I could nonstop
Throughout the 20th century there were many influential pieces of literature that would not only tell a story or teach a lesson, but also let the reader into the author’s world. Allowing the reader to view both the positives and negatives in an author. Ernest Hemingway was one of these influential authors. Suffering through most of his life due to a disturbingly scarring childhood, he expresses his intense mental and emotional insecurities through subtle metaphors that bluntly show problems with commitment to women and proving his masculinity to others.
I taught myself to read when I was twenty years old. The book I started with was I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou.
Ernest Hemingway was a great American author whom started his career humbly in a newspaper office in Kansas City at the ripe, young age of seventeen. Once the United States joined World War One, Hemingway deemed it fit to join a volunteer ambulance service. During this time Hemingway was wounded, and decorated by the Italian Government for his noble deeds. Once he completely recovered, he made his way back to the United States. Upon his arrival he became a reporter for the American and Canadian newspapers and was sent abroad to cover significant events. For example, he was sent to Europe to cover the Greek revolution. During his early adulthood, Hemingway became a member of the group of expatriate Americans in Paris. This is known as the time in his life in which he describes in two of his novels; A Farewell to Arms and The Sun Also Rises the latter of the two being his first work. Hemingway was able to use his experiences of serving in the front during the war and his experience of being with other expatriates after the war to shape both of these novels. He was able to successful write these novels due to his past experience with working for newspapers. His experience with the newspaper seemed to be far more beneficial than just supplying him with an income, with the reporting experience under his belt he also was able to construct another novel that allowed him to sufficiently describe his experiences reporting during the Civil War; For Whom the Bell Tolls. Arguably his most tremendous short novel was a about an old fisherman’s journey and the long, lonely struggle with a fish and the sea with his victory being in defeat.
There are many authors in this world, but there are also many legends. Legends who changed the face of literature. One of these legends was none other than Ernest Hemingway. Ernest Miller Hemingway was born on July 21st, 1899, in Oak Park, Illinois. He was born to a physician and former opera performer named Clarence and Grace. Hemingway showed a talent in writing when he was in high school. He wrote for the school’s newspaper and yearbook. After he graduated at the age of 17 in 1916, he began his writing career as a reporter for a newspaper called, the Kansas City Star. After he worked as a reporter for six months, he dropped out because he wanted to join the U.S army during World War I. But because he failed the medical test, he joined the American Field Service Ambulance Corps in Italy. Unfortunately, while he was delivering supplies, Hemingway was wounded, which ended his career as an ambulance driver. Because of this, he spent lots of time in hospitals and met a nurse named Agnes von Kurowsky, with whom he fell in love with. Sadly, she didn’t return his feelings so Hemingway was heartbroken. This incident inspired him to write one of his well known books, “A Farewell to Arms”. Like this book, many other of his famous works came to be because of incidents in his past. His pieces of literature started to be known and read worldwide which provided him a route to become one of the most celebrated authors of his time.
Toni Morrison’s Beloved stumbles upon issues that we do not face in our day-to-day life, yet Morrison has unquestionably become one of the most taught, influential American writers today. Beloved is “suspended between the nastiness of life and the meanness of the dead” (Pg 4), drenched with a fury situated in the interior of the family living at 124 Bluestone. Even though the story of Beloved is not an easy one to discuss, it is one that has earned the right to be conferred, and has become a necessity to teach.
It wasn’t until elementary school that I noticed I started to develop literacy skills. I was never big into reading. Writing has always been easier for me, but I would say the 2nd grade is when I realized how important being able to read and write was, to be successful in life. I really can’t remember a time that I have actually read a book from start to finish and I don’t have much literacy history, because I was the only child and I always found other ways to keep myself occupied. My parents both worked full time jobs and long hours so the subject was never pressed on me when I was at home. I was pretty responsible as a child. I would go to and from school on my bicycle, then after school, I would do my homework and my chores before I went outside to play. When I was in school, I always had a lot of friends, so reading and writing never really fit in to my schedule at all. I knew at an early age, that I didn’t really care about literacy.
I also remember as young girl learning how to read and my favorite book that I could quote word for word was “Green Eggs and Ham” by Dr.Suess. I loved that book so much I still have that today. As I got older my love for reading and books started to diminish, I went to a private school for my elementary years and their curriculum was very intense. It was required to read a book from their approved list and complete a book report each summer before the school year began. Not to mention the numerous books reports I would have to complete during the school. At an early age books and reading was something I had to do and not what I wanted to do.
In 2000, the semi-autobiographical romantic-comedy, Almost Famous, was released to the world. The film was both written and directed by Cameron Crowe. The majority of Almost Famous takes place in 1973, as 15 year-old rock journalist, William Miller (Patrick Fugit), tours across the country with the up and coming band Stillwater while writing an article for Rolling Stone magazine. During his time on the road he encounters a wide variety of people, ranging from lead groupie, Penny Lane (Kate Hudson), to Stillwater guitarist, Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup), and all the while relying on and remaining in contact with San Diego based renowned rock writer, Lester Bangs (Philip Seymour Hoffman). William is exposed to a world he never knew existed and
I believe that reading non-fiction gives the reader more of a personal feel. There were millions of slaves that were transported across the Atlantic. In Reversing Sail, it gives you the straight facts that they know about the people, the counties and routes that were taken. Most people would find it boring when reading about the straight facts and information as if they were reading from an Encyclopedia. I believe that reading non-fiction is great to a point, it is better to link it with a personal or fictional story.
My parents instilled a passion for reading in me even as a toddler; years later, an excellent,
Reading has been a part of my life from the second I was born. All throughout my childhood, my parents read to me, and I loved it. I grew up going to the library and being read to constantly. Especially in the years before Kindergarten, reading was my favorite thing to do. I grew up loving fairy tales and thriving on the knowledge that I could have any book I wanted, to be read to me that night. Having no siblings, my only examples were my parents, and they read constantly. Without a family that supported my love of reading throughout my childhood, I wouldn’t appreciate it nearly as much as I have and do now.
I do not remember any time in my life, when I was not aware of books. My earliest memory is of my uncle telling me a story about a wicked dragon, which steals a treasure, and the group of heroes, who go to confront him in battle. He used to tell me this story in sequels, a small amount every week, so by the time next week came up, I would be totally waiting in anticipation. It was when I started reading myself, that I realized that he had been retelling Tolkien's "The Hobbit". To this day "The Hobbit" is one of my favorite books, I read it to bring back memories of my child hood, when I’m depressed, or when I plain don’t have anything else to read.