Critical Analysis Of David Foster Wallace On Life And Work

“Can you live in that moment, as best as you can, with clear eyes and love in your heart? With joy in your heart? If you can do that gentlemen then you’re perfect.” Doesn't take much dose it? This speech has so much meaning and and purpose behind it.

Michael was successful in convincing his point of view through the use of pathos. His audience was enjoying his speech because of the touch of humor in his talk. He started his speech with rejecting a common belief, this was a bit surprising as well as funny at the same time. He explained that “we see it in religions and self-help books: money can’t buy

Through proving that we are not always correct, and reminding the audience that different people can have different views of reality, Wallace is able to use logical reasoning to show that humans have the ability to change their perspectives.

This film focuses on being a confident and decisive person in life, through passionate and informed topics. Public speaking is the process of speaking to a group of people in a structured, deliberate manner intended to inform, influence, or entertain the listeners.¹ After watching this film it does strike a cord of wanting to be able to reach out to others and share my own opinions in a strong, confident manner. To inspire others on something I may be passionate about in life, to share a different aspect of life that others have not lived. I can't say exactly how much this film has impacted my views on public speaking although the film itself

4. Throughout the speech, Wallace emphasizes that he is not offering “banal platitude[s]” (paragraph 2) or “moral advice” (paragraph 12). Explain what he means by this. Do you think he successfully avoids these things? Explain.

The novel didn’t really have the best satisfaction between characters, its atmosphere was really awkward, unsettling and funny at times; it is basically a mix of all that. I felt there was no connection between Andy, Connor and Kajsa, and Ethan for the majority of the novel. The three got along well, and Ethan didn’t, which made things awkward in a minute. Ethan wouldn’t help out in setting up tents/putting tents down (“You have to help break camp,” Andy said sternly. “I have to do nothing I don’t want to do,” I replied. “But we’re a team,” Kajsa said. “We’re a team?” I said. “I’m not wearing any uniform. I didn’t join any team” 117; 20-25). Ethan would also play mind games at times, chapter fifteen is an excellent chapter to see how Ethan

Wallace establishes a humorous tone in the first section to convey his argument. “There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, ‘Morning, boys, how's the water?’ And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, ‘What the hell is water?’” (233) This anecdote introduces the fact the many people don’t understand what is going on around them and why Wallace believes it is important to be conscious of what is happening around you. “This is not a matter of virtue- it's a matter of my choosing to do the work of somehow altering or getting free of my natural, hard-wired default-setting, which is to be deeply and literally self-centered, and to see and interpret everything through this lens of self.” (233) Wallace argues that it is hard to get into a state of awareness because humans have their “hard-wired default-setting”. People need to get out of their own self-centered habits and see things in a different point of view. By using a humorous tone, Wallace can effectively get people on his side of the argument.

Wallace then discussed that the most important way to fight the urge of staying in their natural default-setting is to think. Wallace tried to persuade the audience by stressing the importance of exercising control over what that person thinks. Wallace felt it was very important to get the point across that people

And this speech was a clear example of that. He offers a story about a young man who set off around the world attempting to find the meaning of life when one faithful day he stumbled upon a mansion where he was created and offered dinner by butlers and maids. The owner appeared to be a king who was gravely ill, shortly after a man wielding a weapon in one hand entered the room, the young man left the mansion and it disappeared, the young man could not understand, yet after continuing his travels he happened to find the mansion once again only this time he asked the ill owner of the mansion “tell me your story, what is the source of your pain” and in that very moment he had discovered the true meaning of life. To give yourself to others. His final words in this speech were something I am not ashamed to say almost brought me to tears. The passion and the way in which I was able to relate were astonishing. Michael Himes said and I quote “The thing that I wish for you is that sometime in your life you get a chance to say to people who mean an enormous amount to you what it is that has been truest in your own life because in a moment like that that you know that everything you gave away has been given back in

The commencement speech, “This is Water” by David Foster Wallace is widely known due to the amazing message it provides. Wallace’s speech is unlike any other, which are usually very positive, inspirational, and oftentimes cliche. He asserts that the value behind an education is learning how to become aware of what we choose to think, and in doing so it brings freedom and vitality to an individual. His speech is very unorthodox, the structure is very different to normal graduation speeches, making his oration unique and special. Wallace uses rhetorical appeals to speak with recent graduates.

The rhetorical analysis I composed was written on an article called,“The confessions of a liberal gun owner,”by Justin Cronin. This type of writing opened me up to a new style of composing that I am not familiar with. I really enjoyed being able to show my view of whether I thought that this article was effective. Critisizing the writer for doing certain things was very interesting and made me feel more independent and powerful. I did not like that I could not use my personal opinion but could use what I thought as the audience of the paper. This confused me at first but I eventually understood the reasoning behind it. Telling my personal opinon would dismay readers and disregard my credibility. By stating facts it made my paper sound more

Wallace has a very colloquial style to his word choice and presentation of his speech. He has a unique way of making listeners feel comfortable and safe listening to him speak. He appears to talk to the listener’s as if they are having on a one-on-one conversation with each and every person listening. Wallace also works hard to present himself as an equal, no more righteous or smarter than anyone in the audience. He chooses to remind everyone not to “think that I'm giving you moral advice, or that I'm saying you're “supposed to” think this way” (Wallace 12), but to offer advice and new insight into changing our perspective on the world. This comfortable word choice is a unique way for Wallace to make himself more relatable to the graduates and listeners in general.

David Wallace's speech is organized to enable the listener, or reader, to see the reality of adulthood and then the power we have to choose whether or not we live a mindful, empathetic, truly conscious life. Wallace's tone throughout the speech is very friendly, and he uses casual language to make this audience feel comfortable. He uses metaphors about fish in water to illustrate the illusion of self. Another about Eskimos to show how arrogant people can be. He then goes into how secretly self-centered we all are, how we think we are the "center of the universe", because everything we experience is from our perspective like how "Other people's thoughts and feelings have to be communicated to you somehow, but your own are so immediate, urgent, real"(Wallace, 2005). Moreover, Wallace goes into the power of worship, and the deadening effect of daily routine.

It was interesting to see that he used supporting material that many might not catch. He used repetitive statements that stayed in our minds, such as mentioning all children including the future generations. He repeated the phrase, “I have a dream”, in addition to repeating freedom. A reminder of what we were fighting for but he also repeated, “one hundred years later….”, in which he reminded the audience that the change had not happened yet, but the promise remained and we should continue to fight and hope for the

I seem to have the same problem, more often than not. It is more difficult for me to summarize someone else's work, than to write my own paper. I usually have different people read my work out loud several times, just to make sure that I am not just paraphrasing when summarizing or using others' work.