Analysis Of Total Eclipse By Annie Dillard

In literature, themes shape and characterize an author’s writing making each work unique as different points of view are expressed within a writing’s words and sentences. This is the case, for example, of Edgar Allan Poe’s poem “Annabel Lee” and Emily Dickinson’s poem “Because I could not stop for Death.” Both poems focus on the same theme of death, but while Poe’s poem reflects that death is an atrocious event because of the suffering and struggle that it provokes, Dickinson’s poem reflects that death is humane and that it should not be feared as it is inevitable. The two poems have both similarities and differences, and the themes and characteristics of each poem can be explained by the author’s influences and lives.

The opening line in “Total Eclipse” is “It had been like dying, that sliding down the mountain pass” (477). Annie Dillard is describing traveling through the mountains and down into the Yakima Valley and how she feels this place is so strange because it is all new to her. This gives you an idea of Annie Dillard’s

Death is unwelcome news for all human beings, but at the same time, it is an unavoidable incident that everyone should accept. About this statement, some people might argue that the death is a part of people’s life, while people cannot avoid it. In “The Death of the Moth”, Virginia Woolf, the writer of the essay, claims that people should be aware of mortality and accept the death with a deferential attitude through the observation of the little moth’s death throes. The key concepts of the essay release as the writer illustrates her attitudes that change chronologically as she comprehends the moth’s fierce fight with death. By introducing the essay with a brief but detailed description of ‘a pleasant morning, mid-September’ (125), she leads the readers to get the background idea of the moth’s upcoming fate. Initially, Woolf’s feeling towards the moth was pity and pathetic. The sentence, “… his zest in enjoying his meager opportunities to the full, pathetic.” (125), describes how the author perceives a moth as a trivial, minor creature. However, after she encounters and apprehends the moth’s furious fights against death, her feeling shifts toward admiration and respect. “… This gigantic effort on the part of an insignificant little moth, against a power of such magnitude, to retain what no on else valued or desired to keep, moved one strangely” (127). Eventually, the essay concludes with author’s claim on death’s strangeness: the true nature of life and death and the motivational attitude towards the death.

“The tragedy...is in enteral stasis,” Marina Keegan says in her short essay Cold Pastoral. Her words vaguely foreshadow the essay’s main character,, Claire’s, emotions throughout the events of the story. Claire deals with the loss of her lover Brian while preparing for his vigil at the University of Vermont. She experiences self-consciousness, jealousy, and anger as she tries to cope with grief. These coping mechanisms result in a mentally draining week and can be used as a warning against those experiencing grief themselves.

In Laurie Ann Guerrero’s poem “Morning Praise Of Nightmares, One,” the speaker’s use of the poetic elements set a serious tone, use of a paradoxical title, and ambiguous language, yet attention to detail leads you to assess the poem as an interpretation of a vivid dream. The speaker’s image of the human body, between life's lushness, and death’s natural process, highlights a human behavior.

The purpose of this essay is to analyze the theme, tone, and figurative language in the poem “There is No Word for Goodbye” by Mary Tall Mountain. The theme in this poem is that the word goodbye is forever, and it Isn’t used because they will see each other again, perhaps in an afterlife. The tone is calm and comforting as she speaks to her worried nephew. The theme and tone are both carried throughout the poem and it is notable because of the metaphors used. The two elements of figurative language in this poem are both metaphors, as it doesn’t appear there are any other types in the poem.The first metaphor used in the poem states that “the net of wrinkles into wise black pools of her eyes.” This contributes to the theme of the poem because it shows that the aunt is old

So much had changed in so little time. As of yesterday and today, we have been on a train with no food and water. I couldn’t think of anything possibly worse than this. Throughout the night, Madame Schafter, a quiet, kind mother, howled all night about a fire which only she could see, which scared me. If someone so calm and level headed was hallucinating, what was I? “‘Look! Look at this fire! This terrible fire!’” (Wiesel 25). What fire was she talking about? Was she talking about the h*ll we were enduring on the cattle car? I had heard rumors that there were crematories wherever we were going, if they were even true. Men in the cattle car tied her up and gagged her, and eventually beat her into silence (Wiesel 26). Although I pitied Madame Schafter, her screaming was driving me crazy, and I too felt the urge to slap her across the face, anything to silence the screaming. I guess that as of now, thinking straight is out of the question. Little did I know that thinking straight would be out of the question for a very long time.

She describes their movement as aimless, and careless because of their lack of motivation to struggle on, seeing life as “ought” or nothing compared to what it once was before the loss. The reader can imagine being in the position of the sufferer; very stagnant, and lifeless almost like a corpse which is what makes this form of diction so evoking.

Emily Dickinson is one of the most important American poets of the 1800s. Dickinson, who was known to be quite the recluse, lived and died in the town of Amherst, Massachusetts, spending the majority of her days alone in her room writing poetry. What few friends she did have would testify that Dickinson was a rather introverted and melancholy person, which shows in a number of her poems where regular themes include death and mortality. One such poem that exemplifies her “dark side” is, “Because I Could Not Stop for Death”. In this piece, Dickinson tells the story of a soul’s transition into the afterlife showing that time and death have outright power over our lives and can make what was once significant become meaningless.

Regardless of race, caste, religion, or age, every human has wondered about the one fact of life that unifies us all: What is death? Both poems, “Death of a Young Son by Drowning” by Margaret Atwood and “Because I could Not Stop for Death” by Emily Dickinson share a common subject of death. Using figurative language, both poems illustrate distinct takes on a similar topic.

…as the sun declined towards the horizon, the wind died away into a gentle breeze and the sea became free from breakers. But these gave place to a heavy swell; I felt sick and hardly able to hold the rudder, when suddenly I saw a line of high land towards the south. Almost spent, as I was, by fatigue and the dreadful suspense I endured for several hours, this sudden certainty of life rushed like a flood of warm joy to my heart, and tears gushed from my eyes. How mutable are our feelings, and how strange is that clinging love we have of life even in the excess of misery (211).

Instead of writing one complete novel, Dillard writes many small short stories recounting various personal narratives. It is called “Total Eclipse” and it is about a couple that go to see a total eclipse 5 hours from the Washington coast. The way Dillard compares something as simple as crossing the mountains in their car to the death of someone. Also her use of imagery allows me to have an accurate picture of the hotel room and the painting of the clown. Throughout the first story the theme seemed to be about experiencing a moment. Dillard used the eclipse to illustrate this perfectly. The speaker had seen eclipses before but never in person. Almost 3-4 pages are devoted to explaining and describing the event. During the eclipse the speaker gives the reader information surrounding it. I personally enjoyed the comparison between the relationship between a partial and total eclipse to the relationship of kissing and marrying a man.“‘It can never be satisfied, the mind, never’”(24) I particularly enjoyed this quote because of how true it is. The mind has a thirst for knowledge that can never be quenched always wanting to dive deeper, climb higher and know more. The second is called “An Expedition to the Pole”, the first half of it is split between two seemingly unrelated stories. One about the north and south poles while the other talks about someone who points out the problems with the catholic beliefs. Later a third section is brought in

In Robert Pack’s poem “To an Empty Page”, the narrator is uncertain about what comes with death. He worries about his future and what may happen to him. As he asks questions into the emptiness, he finds answers in the echoes of his voice. Robert Pack uses literary devices such as rhetorical questions, selection of detail, metaphors, and juxtaposition to construct the meaning of his poem.

As Laurell K Hamilton once said, “death is the last intimate thing we ever do”. It comes in different ways and at different times, but death comes for all of us. In Kate Chopin’s novel The Awakening, Edna is faced with enormous heartache and desperation that she feels she has no other choice but to take her own life. This is paralleled in The Tooth and The Lottery, two short stories by Shirley Jackson. Both stories feature a character who is met with their death at unexpected moments in their lives, but in very different situations. The event of death plays a central role in these three works.

Jeannette Walls, an American writer, wrote when people kill themselves, they think they are ending the pain, but all they are really doing is passing it on to those they leave behind (Walls 113). The loss and anxiousness one has to feel must be devastatingly overwhelming with no possibility of hope if suicide becomes an option rather than life. As Kate Chopin demonstrates in The Awakening, the question of whether Edna Pontellier’s choice of suicide was one of circumstance or premeditation becomes relevant as the story ends, which leaves the reader pondering why. She continues swimming out into the bleakness where her thoughts are only of herself and how she can be free but giving no thought to the ramifications of her actions. The readers