One evening in the fall of the junior year, I was in the library when I discovered a small slip of paper that changed my life. On that slip of paper was a quote from the writer H. Melville. At the time of this discovery, I was a biology major and football player. Even though I had a work study in the library I was not particularly interested in literature. However, I was so infatuated with this writing I discovered, that I immersed myself into it. Although the first time I read the slip of paper I did not fully comprehend its meaning, the final clause embedded itself swiftly into me. Before this moment, I never truly thought about how small minded and uncultured I was. I slowly began to immerse myself in the letture. I wanted to see just how …show more content…
ust by coincidentally finding that slip of paper, my life changed drastically. Although I did not change my major, I still read every night. While I fell in love with literature, I also began to realize the beauty in nature. Growing up in farmland, seeing this vast lake on my campus amazed me. I started to draw connections between my reading and the lake. After I graduated, I began to travel the world while working an internship. I traveled mostly the sea but I started to understand Melville's writing more and more. After the internship, I began to unfold. I wrote a book which failed, then I became a professor at Harvard and started my professional career. This event obviously changed the path of my life but it also changed the way I viewed life. Finding that slip of paper sparked growth and knowledge that I did not know was attainable. Before this event, I was just living. I did not question much and I also did not explore anything. I grew up in a small farm town where academia was not immensely important. I didn’t read much and I did not travel. One could say I was small minded. However, once I read that slip of paper, I had this insatiable need to unfold within myself, and feel myself doing so. The thought of becoming wiser and wilder thrilled
I'm not so sure that Floyd Dell's work, Intellectual Vagabondage would be so important to me if I hadn't come across it halfway through high school when I was ready to have some illusions blown away. I came across it at a Goodwill or Salvation Army, I forget which. There it was, hiding among all the Reader's Digest Condensed Books and suchlike, just waiting to twist my head around.
Meyer, Michael, ed. The Bedford Introduction to Literature: Reading, Thinking, Writing. 5th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999.
Literature; it has compelled us, entertained us, educated us, and drove us to madness. It has served as life instruction, by using the characters as the lesson plan. It is sometimes blunt, sometimes ugly, and in Truman Capote’s case, is so gruesome that we do not dare forget it.
Meyer, Michael, ed. Thinking and Writing About Literature. Second Edition. New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2001.
Richard Wright, in his essay “Discovering Books,” explains how reading books changed his outlook on life and eventually his life itself. The first book that widened his horizons was an overtly controversial book by H. L. Mencken. I have a story not so dissimilar from his.
In this semester, I had to take the English 1301 course. However, I did not see myself liking this course and did not have the best attitude towards it. This course changed my overall experience with writing. In the course I gained so much knowledge that I did not see myself learning. This essay will help analyze my experience throughout the entire journey. It will help understand how I became the writer I am today. Over the last several weeks, I have grown into a great writer that I did not see myself as.
There are various changes that can occur in an individual’s life. Some variations are very little and would not affect your lifecycle very greatly. Nevertheless, other events could be very significant and could change a person’s entire life, such as marrying, giving birth to the baby, or losing someone special. The important event that transformed my life is coming to the United States of America to get education and to study. When I first arrived in this country, I comprehended that an incredible change would happen in my life both mentally and physically. After living more than one year in the United States, I definitely believe that moving to the United States is an advantageous change for me. This change offers me an opportunity to live a healthy lifestyle as well as a new way of thinking that are significant for me and the most importantly it provided me a better education in a simple way.
A person does not experience many events that shape their life in a large way, whether it be for better or worse. I have had just one major situation that has sculpted me into the person that I am today. In February of 2008, I was diagnosed with a life changing disease; it would relieve me of the agony I had been experiencing for as long as I could remember, but also restrict my diet for the rest of my life.
Head, Bessie. “Life.” Literature and the Writing Process. Ed. Elizabeth McMahn, et al. 6th ed. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2002. 349-355.
Everyone has a special event that determines our life journey. This event can give us identity, happiness or even pain and sadness. The special event that changed my life was deciding to play basketball because basketball helped me find peace, happiness and gave me identity. When I was ten years old my grandfather succumbed to cancer. His death created hatred inside of me.
As I look back on my life, I can see how a lot of certain events have shaped my life. Where it They helped me become more independent, have some of the greatest accomplishments, and understand the importance of living your own life.
...from high school with high hopes that college would add the finishing touches to my writing skills – I knew I still had flaws in my style, and I didn’t know how to fix them. And now here I am, aiming to become a successful novelist or screenwriter of some sort (as long as it allows my imagination to run wild).
“The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost is one of my favorite poems for many reasons, but recently it has started to gain new meaning as I face graduation. I have started to wonder how different my life would be if I had only chosen to travel down one road instead of sprinting down both roads at the same time. When I declared my biology major, my dad expressed concern that I was choosing one possible life and career over another possibility. He said he knew how happy writing made me and he wondered if I was doing the right thing in not pursuing that. He spoke the words I had not yet spoken out loud for myself. “You shouldn’t enter college worried about what you will do when you exit,” said David Rubenstein, co-founder of the Carlyle Group, at a World Economic Forum panel discussion last week on the state of the humanities. Rubenstein’s words are true now and they were true then: I should not have worried about choosing so soon. After I arrived at Columbia College, I began taking English courses because I could not take biology courses without at least trying to explore my passion for literature and creative writing. Thanks to time at Columbia College, I started to see the value the required courses of the WPDM major more because of what they taught me about myself than what they taught me about the subject matter. Combined with my classes, my internship experiences have confirmed that I am indeed heading in the right direction. I could not become a successful writer and biologist without the valuable set of skills that I have gained through my time at Columbia College. I believe I made the right choice by choosing both roads.
An Event which changed my life, well when, I think back on my life there’s
Many years ago when I was a freshman in high school, an event happened to me that changed my life for the better. My friend invited me to go hiking with him and his sister. He was going to go hiking in Yosemite. The following day I prepared myself mentally and physically in order to accomplish this hike.