The Scum Also Rises Analysis

Around the time of the novels publication in the late 1960s, a new literary genre had begun to surface: New Journalism. New Journalism sought to combine the elements of news writing and journalism with the elements of fiction writing. Described as being a form of literature that “engages and excites”, it sought to challenge its readers not only “emotionally” but also “intellectually”. Typically, New Journalism consists of four major characteristics such as

Clay Shirky who wrote Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable (1993) argues that society doesn’t need newspapers society needs journalism to save society. Shirky supports this argument by giving a historical background to the problems newspapers face and how the problems have developed over time and the solutions society has came up with. The blogger concludes that in order for journalism to go farther new models must be created in place of past molds. Shirky directs this blog toward the current and future generations in attempt to motivate new models and methods of journalism.

Didion personifies the wind as almost an unknown epidemic. Similar to when an unknown disease goes viral, all walks of life are affected. Didion clearly states how teachers, students, doctors, to physicists, to generally everyone becomes unhappy and uncomfortable during the winds. She does not write of how the wind caused fire to ravage the shrublands, but she writes of the symptoms it inflicts on the people. Didion mentions all the after effects of the wind and the harm it can do like inflict paranoia. She mentions how the fear-stricken victims of southern California are paranoid like her neighbor that refuses to leave the house and her husband who roams with a machete. Didion’s personification of the wind focuses on a fearful and distant light.

     Didion paints uneasy and somber images when describing the Santa Ana winds. “There is something uneasy in the Los Angeles air… some unnatural stillness, some tension,” starts the essay off with the image of Los Angeles people in a sense of stillness or tense. She further adds, “Blowing up sandstorms out along Route 66… we will see

Joan Didion uses pathos to argue that Santa Ana causes people to have weird behaviors. When Joan uses the example that the “Indians would throw themselves into the sea,”(Didion) she creates the emotion of sadness and shock. Didion chose these emotions to show that the wind makes people do strange actions. She also says that, “every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands necks. Anything can happen.”(Didion) She causes a sense of horror using the excerpt from, “On nights like that” by Raymond Chandler. It gives a sense of horror because it shows how far the wind can make people do bad actions when the wind blows. Joan Didion incorporates

Hunter S. Thompson was the man responsible for what is known today as gonzo journalism. This type of journalism is written in the first-person narrative and places the reporter in the middle of the action, allowing for personal experiences, emotions, and biases in a way that defies traditional journalism. Thompson’s subversive style of journalism was so radical that according to Jennifer Marinelli’s (2010) post on the Michigan Online News Association, “Thompson didn’t just create a new form of journalism. He created a new way of thinking that is still important in today’s society” (para. 2). In other words, he didn’t just transform journalism; he transformed people’s minds. Perhaps this should not come as a surprise that such a man could

Didion’s descriptive diction helps readers envision effects of the unusual Santa Ana Winds. She says that, “we will see smoke back in the canyons, and hear sirens in the night” which effectively brings to mind thoughts of fires caused by the Santa Ana Winds without having to directly reference them. Later in her essay, she uses small details to emphasize the widespread effects when she

There are always two sides to every story, sometimes even more. When discussing the phenomenon of the Santa Ana winds and their accompanying brush fires, Linda Thomas and Joan Didion each have their own side of the story. Throughout the texts, Didion and Thomas converge with one another by means of their life experiences as southern Californians and also through using sensory details to illustrate their stories. However, they do not share similar feelings towards the nature of the winds and fire. The authors diverge in this way as well as in their viewpoints on the conflict of people and nature.

In Ann Petry’s novel, The Street, the wind and the city come alive through Petry’s use of personification, imagery, and figurative language. The wind is bullying the people on the streets and Lutie Johnson is one of them. Lutie just moved to the city and is looking for a place to stay but the wind is trying to keep her out.

In contrast, Didion wants to convey a message about the absolute darkness of the winds. Therefore, Didion starts off with the uneasiness of the people and how they can feel it coming. She then uses about seven scientific facts to explain the cynical effects of the winds and then move on to a dreadful fourteen days. Structured this way, Didion focused on just the negatives of the winds, conveying her

Didion’s choice of words is one of the most important contributors to the mood she develops in her essay about the Santa Ana Winds, and gives the essay ethos as well. Although she does not use too much personification, the little she does use about the wind “whining down the Cajon and San Gorgonio Passes” sets up the rest of her description of what the winds do in a way that almost makes it seem that the wind is a malevolent being, set on scorching the mind and surrounding environment. Her use of adjectives unquestionably reverberates her negative opinion on the winds; she blatantly calls them “bad,” and “malevolent.” The ominous, uneasy description of the heat and weather support that view.

Well-known essayist and writer, Joan Didion, in her essay, The Santa Ana, acknowledges the Santa Ana winds and the effects they have on human behavior. Writing poems, stories, and essays for twenty five years, Linda Thomas, in her essay, Brush Fire, addresses the Santa Ana winds and the beauty it has on nature and the devastating disaster it has on human construction. Didion’s purpose is to inform her readers how the winds themselves influence the way people act. Thomas’s purpose is to arouse her readers on the beneficials of the Santa Ana winds on nature. Didion adopts an anxious tone in order to specify to her readers that the winds are catastrophic and their effects are inevitable. Thomas, however, adopts an ambivalent tone to convey to

Thucydides, who was known as one of the first journalists this world has ever seen and the man who recorded in a very detailed style around 25-30 years of war between Sparta and Athens, had a very unique method of reporting. Thucydides showed a very strong interest in reporting real life human situations to the world. He set tremendous high expectations in the truth and accuracy in his reporting’s. When Rosenstiel notes the “real questions” when confronting reporters, Rosenstiel says “What religion are your journalists practicing? Are they journalists who distinguish business? Or are they business people who understand journalism?”. These questions can distinguish between a loyal reporter, compared to a fake one. “Journalism” can be defined as the act of writing stories to prepare websites or newspapers to broadcast any important situation. Journalism takes real life events and informs the public for their benefit which happens to be very different from entertainment, propaganda, fiction, and art. Journalism provides real life events to the public in order for the public to benefit and make better decisions after. Entertainment is the act of amusing or making the readers/crowd feel a sense of enjoyment. Although Journalism can be similar to fiction and art, they are both very different. The thing that separates journalism from fiction and art is grounded on the fact that journalism thrives off real life and true situations, rather then fiction and art. Propaganda can be

Even after forty years, Hunter S. Thompson’s creation of gonzo journalism became a new style of writing that remains imitated. Gonzo journalism has many different characteristics; one of the most predominant is