I am an ordinary student in Fudan University, without enough confidence. In the depth of my mind, I always think that there are so many excellent peers in this campus, so that I am not a noticed one, as together with so many outstanding students, I am not noticeable at all. Moreover, I almost never have the desire to show or present myself before the public, and I don’t want to be the focus among all. In fact, I gradually get used to this situation, even begun to enjoy it.
So, as a result of that, I become more and more love writing, as it is so private a thing. I don’t have to suffer the outside surroundings or other people, I can totally be alone by myself, overwhelming by my own thoughts, and then write them down. To me, writing is just something enjoyable.
At the beginning of this semester, I found there was a course called Advanced English Writing, instructed by Ron. I selected this course without hesitation, for on one hand I have the need to improve my English writing ability, and on the other hand this course is very fit for me, as students don’t have to present themselves but only have to write down what they want to say, which is just what I love and enjoy.
Ron is from VCU, the United States. First, he let us read four stories one by one, write our own reading log and discuss with each other. All those four stories are very wonderful, and written by famous writers in the history of literature. Then we started to do the essay – choose one story of the four and try to prove our own thesis. Thanks to Ron’s instruction, all of us completed the thesis first, and then draft one, draft two, and draft three. I believe that everyone tried his best to perfect his essay according to Ron’s annotations and suggestions, including me. Except for reading logs and the essay, Ron also makes us to practice the timed-writing, and also, he gives comments on each of our timed-writing essay. I have to say that, Ron is the most responsible instructor I have ever met in this university. Sometimes he has to read hundreds of drafts or essays within a week, but he never delayed; he tried to remember all our names, and he finally succeeded; he is always very glad to help students and never tired of that. I believe, all the students like Ron, and his teaching activity.
During the whole semester, I have learned a lot from this writing class. And I find my writing ability have a rapid progress, which made me very happy and surprised. I can remember clearly how I struggled to use a foreign language to express myself. For example, the thesis of the essay, I did the revise to it at least four or five times, for I could not use the accurate words or the sentence pattern is not appropriate. But with the help of Ron, I finally got a strong thesis, and completed the essay after times of revise. Ron said in his comments to my draft two that “You have a clear and strong thesis and you use evidence from the story to support it. The language is clear and flows well.” which made me so delighted that now I feel much more confident than at the beginning.
As a conclusion, I love this writing class as well as the instructor, Ron, through which and from whom I learned a lot and had an obvious progress in my English writing ability. What is much more important is, I am finding back my lost confidence gradually, which make myself have more smiles in the daily life. I will remember the class, and put my thanks to Ron deep in my heart, for ever.
Carol Xie
May 9, 2007
Draft 3
Lethal Vanity
Back to the late nineteenth century, in Paris, the society was organized on a class basis; even the French Revolution could not totally eradicate the class distinctions, which remained an integral part of French society at that time. The class distinctions were so strict that it was very difficult for people to change or move from the class into which they were born, in that case, a man often chose a wife on the basis of how large her fortune was, as a husband would receive a dowry from the family of his future bride during the time.
But unfortunately, Mathilde Loisel, “one of those pretty and charming girls” (38), was only born in a family of clerks. Guy de Maupassant, one of the greatest writers in the history of literary, who was born in the nineteenth century, kept writing and tried to criticize the class basis in the novel the Necklace, through the story of Mathilde. In order to dress herself up to attend the ball, Mathilde borrowed a necklace from one of her friends but accidentally lost it, for which she paid ten years of hard work but finally that “expensive” necklace turned out to be a fake one. The ten-year hardship may be too heavy a punishment for Mathilde, but it was her own excessive vanity that led to the big change in her life.
At the beginning of the story, Mathilde’s vanity is revealed elementarily. She married to a little clerk and dressed plainly, as the family could not afford the good dressing, but “she was unhappy as though she had really fallen from her proper station” (38). Mathilde always thought that she should belong to a higher rank, but the situation of the time could not satisfy her. “She suffered ceaselessly, feeling herself born for all the delicacies and all the luxuries.” (38)The writer has further descriptions, which made the figure of Mathilde much more vivid: She suffered from “the poverty of her dwelling” (38), “the wretched look of the walls” (38), “the worn-out chairs” (38), “the ugliness of the curtains” (38), which would draw attention from no other women of her rank. But they “tortured her and made her angry” (39). Mathilde is presented as a woman who was never content with the temporal life she was leading then, especially her appearance, the house she lived in, and the fitments, which were all about the “vanity fair”. We can imagine how those things bothered her in the daily life. She suffered a lot, because of her own vanity.
Except for her suffering, Mathilde always thought of many beautiful things that never belong to her, including “[T]he silent antechambers hung with Oriental tapestry, lit by tall bronze candelabra, and of the two great footmen in knee breeches who sleep in the big armchairs, made drowsy by the heavy warmth of the hot-air stove” (39); “the long salons fitted up with ancient silk, of the delicate furniture carrying priceless curiosities, and of the coquettish perfumed boudoirs made for talks at five o’clock with intimate friends, with men famous and sought after, whom all women envy and whose attention they all desire” (39); “dainty dinners, of shining silverware, of tapestry which peopled the walls with ancient personages and with strange birds flying in the midst of a fairy forest” (39); and “delicious dishes served on marvelous plates and of the whispered gallantries which you listen to with a sphinxlike smile, while you are eating the pink flesh of a trout or the wings of a quail” (39). All those can make up of a complete picture of a luxurious life. Mathilde was so after the silk-stocking life. She craved to lead a better life—a better material life, which would be always admired and envied. She wished to be looked upon to, to be the focus among people, to be together with the rich and distinguished persons. Generally speaking, Mathilde’s vanity decides all her thinking and doing.
When the news came that Mathilde and her husband were invited to a high-level ball, she cried and said “Only I have no dress and therefore I cannot go to this ball. Give your card to some colleague whose wife is better equipped than I.” (40)Through this, we can imagine how often Mathilde complained at home to her husband who was totally in love with her, and how the husband made every efforts to satisfy Mathilde. Moreover, some days before the ball, after she had already got the new dress by spending the four hundred francs by which Mr. Loisel was going to “buy a gun and treat himself to a little shooting next summer on the plain of Nanterre, with several friends who went to shoot larks down there, of a Sunday” (40), Mathilde began to worry about the jewel and “seemed sad, uneasy, anxious” (40). Apparently, Mathilde had been spoiled by her husband, and as a result, her vanity is never getting less.
Mathilde achieved what she wished. She followed Mr. Loisel’s advice to borrow a necklace from Mme. Forestier, and made a great success in the ball. “She was prettier than them all, elegant, gracious, smiling, and crazy with joy” (41). Moreover, “[a]ll the men looked at her, asked her name, endeavored to be introduced” (41), and she even “was remarked by the minister himself” (41). Everything seemed OK, but no one had predicted that, the disaster was coming toward Mathilde and her husband, which was still decided by Mathilde’s vanity. Here are the evidence that Maupassant gave in the story.
First, “she danced with intoxication, with passion, made drunk by pleasure, forgetting all, in the triumph of her beauty, in the glory of her success, in a sort of cloud of happiness composed of all this homage, of all this admiration, of all these awakened desires, and of that sense of complete victory which is so sweet to a woman’s heart.” (41)Those descriptions show clearly that Mathilde was entirely immersed in the happiness that what she had long dreamed of realized eventually. But, only the vanity could lead to this kind of dream, and made Mathilde so intoxicated.
Second, Mr. Loisel “threw over her shoulders the wraps which he had brought, modest wraps of common life, whose poverty contrasted with the elegance of the ball dress” (41), but Mathilde “felt this, and wanted to escape so as not to be remarked by the other women, who were enveloping themselves in costly furs” (41). If Mathilde could think that the wraps reflected Mr. Loisel’s true love, and forgot about all the vanity, what would happen instead? Would the necklace be lost? The answer is no, undoubtedly, because the necklace was much likely to be lost when Mathilde escaped from the wraps on her shoulders and neck. So in the final analysis, Mathilde’s own vanity is the direct chief criminal that should take responsibility for the loss of necklace.
There is a famous saying -- “character decides destiny”. Throughout the whole story, we can see that Mathilde’s own excessive vanity directly led to the ten-year hardship. Though we can ascribe the vanity to the society, to the class distinctions, but the author has told us that, those things “another woman of her rank would never even have been conscious, tortured her and made her angry” (38-39). That is the reason why I call Mathilde’s vanity “excessive”. After finishing that tough ten years, Mathilde lost her beauty, her juvenescence. But meanwhile, I believe, that she must have learned a lot from this punishment.
Title
Back to the late nineteenth century, in Paris, the society was organized on a class basis; even the French Revolution couldn’t totally eradicate the class distinctions, which remained an integral part of French society at that time. The class distinctions were so strict that it was very difficult for people to change or move from the class into which they were born, in that case, a man often chose a wife on the basis of how large her fortune was, as a husband would receive a dowry from the family of his future bride during the time.
But unfortunately, Mathilde Loisel, “one of those pretty and charming girls” (38), was only born in a family of clerks. Guy de Maupassant, one of the greatest writers in the history of literary, who was born in the nineteenth century, kept writing and tried to criticize the class basis in the novel the Necklace, through the story of Mathilde. In order to dress herself up to attend the ball, Mathilde borrowed a necklace from one of her friends but accidentally lost it, for which she paid ten years of hard work but finally that “expensive” necklace turned out to be a fake one. The ten-year hardship may be too heavy a punishment for Mathilde, but it was her own excessive vanity that led to the big change in her life.
Firstly, I’d like to show you the direct details that indicate the loss of the necklace. Once, Mathilde achieved what she wished. She followed Mr. Loisel’s advice to borrow a necklace from Mme. Forestier, and made a great success on the ball. “She was prettier than them all, elegant, gracious, smiling, and crazy with joy” (41). Moreover, “[a]ll the men looked at her, asked her name, endeavored to be introduced” (41), and she even “was remarked by the minister himself” (41). Everything seemed OK, but no one had predicted that, the disaster was coming toward Mathilde and her husband, which was still decided by Mathilde’s vanity. Here are the evidence that Maupassant gave in the story.
First, “she danced with intoxication, with passion, made drunk by pleasure, forgetting all, in the triumph of her beauty, in the glory of her success, in a sort of cloud of happiness composed of all this homage, of all this admiration, of all these awakened desires, and of that sense of complete victory which is so sweet to a woman’s heart.” (41)Those descriptions show clearly that Mathilde was entirely immersed in the happiness that what she had long dreamed of eventually realized. But obviously, only the vanity could lead to this kind of dream, and made Mathilde so intoxicated.
Second, Mr. Loisel “threw over her shoulders the wraps which he had brought, modest wraps of common life, whose poverty contrasted with the elegance of the ball dress” (41), but Mathilde “felt this, and wanted to escape so as not to be remarked by the other women, who were enveloping themselves in costly furs” (41). If Mathilde could think that the wraps reflected Mr. Loisel’s true love, and forgot about all the vanity, what would happen instead? Would the necklace be lost? The answer is no, undoubtedly, because the necklace was much likely to be lost when Mathilde escaped from the wraps on her shoulders and neck. So in the final analysis, Mathilde’s own vanity is the direct chief criminal that should take responsibility for the loss of necklace.
Secondly, at the beginning of the story, Mathilde’s vanity is revealed elementarily. She married to a little clerk and dressed plainly, as the family couldn’t afford the good dressing, but “she was unhappy as though she had really fallen from her proper station” (38). Obviously, Mathilde always thought that she should belong to a higher rank, but the situation of the time couldn’t satisfy her. “She suffered ceaselessly, feeling herself born for all the delicacies and all the luxuries.” (38)The writer has further descriptions, which made the figure of Mathilde much more vivid: She suffered from “the poverty of her dwelling” (38), “the wretched look of the walls” (38), “the worn-out chairs” (38), “the ugliness of the curtains” (38), which would draw attention from no other women of her rank. But they “tortured her and made her angry” (39). Mathilde is presented as a woman who was never content with the temporal life she’s leading then, especially her appearance, the house she lived in, and the fitments, which were all about the “vanity fair”. We can imagine how those things bothered her in the daily life. She suffered a lot, because of her own vanity.
Except for her suffering, Mathilde always thought of many beautiful things that never belong to her, including “[T]he silent antechambers hung with Oriental tapestry, lit by tall bronze candelabra, and of the two great footmen in knee breeches who sleep in the big armchairs, made drowsy by the heavy warmth of the hot-air stove” (39); “the long salons fitted up with ancient silk, of the delicate furniture carrying priceless curiosities, and of the coquettish perfumed boudoirs made for talks at five o’clock with intimate friends, with men famous and sought after, whom all women envy and whose attention they all desire” (39); “dainty dinners, of shining silverware, of tapestry which peopled the walls with ancient personages and with strange birds flying in the midst of a fairy forest” (39); and “delicious dishes served on marvelous plates and of the whispered gallantries which you listen to with a sphinxlike smile, while you are eating the pink flesh of a trout or the wings of a quail” (39). All those can make up of a complete picture of a luxurious life. Mathilde was so after the silk-stocking life. She craved to lead a better life – a better material life, which would be always admired and envied. She wished to be looked upon to, to be the focus among people, to be together with the rich and distinguished persons. Generally speaking, Mathilde’s vanity decides all her thinking and doing.
Thirdly, when the news came that Mathilde and her husband were invited to a high-level ball, she cried and said “Only I have no dress and therefore I can’t go to this ball. Give your card to some colleague whose wife is better equipped than I.” (40)Through this, we can imagine how often Mathilde complained at home to her husband who was totally in love with her, and how the husband made every efforts to satisfy Mathilde. Moreover, some days before the ball, after she had already got the new dress by spending the four hundred francs by which Mr. Loisel was going to “buy a gun and treat himself to a little shooting next summer on the plain of Nanterre, with several friends who went to shoot larks down there, of a Sunday” (40), Mathilde began to worry about the jewel and “seemed sad, uneasy, anxious” (40). All these things, Mr. Loisel was always trying his best to fulfill her dream, and never said “no” to her. Apparently, in a sense, Mathilde had been spoiled by her husband, and as a result, her vanity is never getting less.
As the famous saying “character decides destiny”, throughout the whole story, we can see that Mathilde’s own excessive vanity directly led to the ten-year hardship. Though we can ascribe the vanity to the society, to the class distinctions, but the author has told us that, those things “another woman of her rank would never even have been conscious, tortured her and made her angry” (38-39). That’s the reason why I call Mathilde’s vanity “excessive”. After finishing that tough ten years, Mathilde lost her beauty, her juvenescence. But meanwhile, I believe, that she must have learn a lot from this punishment.
Title
Back to the late nineteenth century, in Paris, the society was organized on a class basis; even the French Revolution couldn’t totally eradicate the class distinctions, which remained an integral part of French society at that time. The class distinctions were so strict that it was very difficult for people to change or move from the class into which they were born, in that case, a man often chose a wife on the basis of how large her fortune was, as a husband would receive a dowry from the family of his future bride during the time.
But unfortunately, Mathilde Loisel, “one of those pretty and charming girls” (38), was only born in a family of clerks. Guy de Maupassant, one of the greatest writers in the history of literary, who was born in the nineteenth century, kept writing and tried to criticize the class basis in the novel the Necklace, through the story of Mathilde. In order to dress herself up to attend the ball, Mathilde borrowed a necklace from one of her friends but accidentally lost it, for which she paid ten years of hard work but finally that “expensive” necklace turned out to be a fake one. The ten-year hardship may be too heavy a punishment for Mathilde, but it was her own excessive vanity that led to the big change in her life.
At the beginning of the story, Mathilde’s vanity is revealed elementarily. She married to a little clerk and dressed plainly, as the family couldn’t afford the good dressing, but “she was unhappy as though she had really fallen from her proper station” (38). Obviously, Mathilde always thought that she should belong to a higher rank, but the situation of the time couldn’t satisfy her. “She suffered ceaselessly, feeling herself born for all the delicacies and all the luxuries.” (38)The writer has further descriptions, which made the figure of Mathilde much more vivid: She suffered from “the poverty of her dwelling” (38), “the wretched look of the walls” (38), “the worn-out chairs” (38), “the ugliness of the curtains” (38), which would draw attention from no other women of her rank. But they “tortured her and made her angry” (39). Mathilde is presented as a woman who was never content with the temporal life she’s leading then, especially her appearance, the house she lived in, and the fitments, which were all about the “vanity fair”. We can imagine how those things bothered her in the daily life. She suffered a lot, because of her own vanity.
Except for her suffering, Mathilde always thought of many beautiful things that never belong to her, including “[T]he silent antechambers hung with Oriental tapestry, lit by tall bronze candelabra, and of the two great footmen in knee breeches who sleep in the big armchairs, made drowsy by the heavy warmth of the hot-air stove” (39); “the long salons fitted up with ancient silk, of the delicate furniture carrying priceless curiosities, and of the coquettish perfumed boudoirs made for talks at five o’clock with intimate friends, with men famous and sought after, whom all women envy and whose attention they all desire” (39); “dainty dinners, of shining silverware, of tapestry which peopled the walls with ancient personages and with strange birds flying in the midst of a fairy forest” (39); and “delicious dishes served on marvelous plates and of the whispered gallantries which you listen to with a sphinxlike smile, while you are eating the pink flesh of a trout or the wings of a quail” (39). All those can make up of a complete picture of a luxurious life. Mathilde was so after the silk-stocking life. She craved to lead a better life—a better material life, which would be always admired and envied. She wished to be looked upon to, to be the focus among people, to be together with the rich and distinguished persons. Generally speaking, Mathilde’s vanity decides all her thinking and doing.
When the news came that Mathilde and her husband were invited to a high-level ball, she cried and said “Only I have no dress and therefore I can’t go to this ball. Give your card to some colleague whose wife is better equipped than I.” (40)Through this, we can imagine how often Mathilde complained at home to her husband who was totally in love with her, and how the husband made every efforts to satisfy Mathilde. Moreover, some days before the ball, after she had already got the new dress by spending the four hundred francs that Mr. Loisel was going to “buy a gun and treat himself to a little shooting next summer on the plain of Nanterre, with several friends who went to shoot larks down there, of a Sunday” (40), Mathilde began to worry about the jewel and “seemed sad, uneasy, anxious” (40). Apparently, Mathilde had been spoiled by her husband, and as a result, her vanity is never getting less.
Mathilde achieved what she wished. She followed Mr. Loisel’s advice to borrow a necklace from Mme. Forestier, and made a great success on the ball. “She was prettier than them all, elegant, gracious, smiling, and crazy with joy” (41). Moreover, “[a]ll the men looked at her, asked her name, endeavored to be introduced” (41), and she even “was remarked by the minister himself” (41). Everything seemed OK, but no one had predicted that, the disaster was coming toward Mathilde and her husband, which was still decided by Mathilde’s vanity. Here are the evidence that Maupassant gave in the story.
First, “she danced with intoxication, with passion, made drunk by pleasure, forgetting all, in the triumph of her beauty, in the glory of her success, in a sort of cloud of happiness composed of all this homage, of all this admiration, of all these awakened desires, and of that sense of complete victory which is so sweet to a woman’s heart.” (41)Those descriptions show clearly that Mathilde was entirely immersed in the happiness that what she had long dreamed of realized eventually. But obviously, only the vanity could lead to this kind of dream, and made Mathilde so intoxicated.
Second, Mr. Loisel “threw over her shoulders the wraps which he had brought, modest wraps of common life, whose poverty contrasted with the elegance of the ball dress” (41), but Mathilde “felt this, and wanted to escape so as not to be remarked by the other women, who were enveloping themselves in costly furs” (41). If Mathilde could think that the wraps reflected Mr. Loisel’s true love, and forgot about all the vanity, what would happen instead? Would the necklace be lost? The answer is no, undoubtedly, because the necklace was much likely to be lost when Mathilde escaped from the wraps on her shoulders and neck. So in the final analysis, Mathilde’s own vanity is the direct chief criminal that should take responsibility for the loss of necklace.
Throughout the whole story, we can see that Mathilde’s own excessive vanity directly led to the ten-year hardship. Though we can ascribe the vanity to the society, to the class distinctions, but the author has told us that, those things “another woman of her rank would never even have been conscious, tortured her and made her angry” (38-39). That’s the reason why I call Mathilde’s vanity “excessive”. After finishing that tough ten years, Mathilde lost her beauty, her juvenescence. But meanwhile, I believe, that she must have learn a lot from this punishment.
0556127
Carol Xie
June 21, 2007
Timed-writing Three
Directions: From The Necklace, what might have been the quality of Mme. Loisel’s life if she had not lost the necklace? Is her life better or worse now?
In The Necklace, the famous author set the plot that Mathilde lost the necklace which was borrowed from Mme. Frontier, and then the whole thing changed her life a lot. She lost the necklace, as well as her youth, and her beauty, because of the ten years of hardship. But besides, she also gained something – something much more important than her loss.
What might have been the quality of Mme. Loisel’s life if she had not lost the necklace? It is very difficult to imagine that. But it is certain that Mathilde’s vanity would have been lasting in her life, until one day she received some other punishment. Maybe she would have been much happier at the very beginning, as she realized her dream in the ball – she was so beautiful, so noticeable and became the focus of almost all the people there. She would have had a short period to enjoy that whole night. But when time went on, Mathilde would have felt unhappy again, as no one can always be living in memory. Her life situation would not have some striking change. After a short period of happiness, she would return to the state of her former life, which had been filled with complain, sadness, and unsatisfactory.
It is obvious that that kind of life cannot be called a high-quality one. In my opinion, losing the necklace is very important in Mathilde’s life, not only because she suffered from the hardship and lost something that she once valued a lot, but also because she learned something very precious – that’s the true meaning of the life. During the hardship, she could realize that life is much more than making herself beautiful, and dreaming of the luxury. Getting rid of the vanity, she would find life much lovelier than before, though she had already lost beauty and youth. She would felt satisfied with the current life, or even grateful. Then the life condition would be totally fresh, as satisfactory can lead to happiness. But if she had not lost the necklace, her living way would not have changed. Overwhelming by vanity, Mathilde can only have a meaningless life.
Then comes the answer. If Mme. Loisel had not lost the necklace, her life would have been worse. The losing necklace is the turning point for her. After the hardship, a better life would be there and waiting for her.
Discussion 1: "The Necklace" by Guy de Maupassant
It is a world famous story, and I've read it for several times, both in Chinese and English. Now, as a sophomore, I think the author wrote the story to express his criticism to the class distinction.
Mathilde was a woman with extraordinary vanity, but as a punishment to her vanity, in my opinion, ten years was much too long and hard. During the ten years, Mathilde showed that she was brave and industrious, not only a snobbish woman. I don't know exactly how the author himself evaluated Mathilde, the character under his pen. But to think deeper, it was the special society constructed by class distinctions that resulted in Mathilde's vanity and then the 10-year punishment to her. Mathilde herself was a victim of that time. The author criticize the society system through Mathilde's tragedy. So I suppose, maybe to Mathilede, the author's attitude was sympathetic.
As we all know, Maupassant, the author of this story, lived in the time after the French Revolution, during which class distinctions were still an integral part of French society. Thanks to his personal experience, such a vivid character could be molded.
Discussion 2; "The Americanization of Shadrach Cohen"
The Americanization of Shadrach Cohen is a entirely new story for me.
Shadrach Cohen was such a great father, who finally won respect from others, including his two sons, though his “Americanization” was not the same as theirs.
Having read the story, I thought about several things. There are two that I think are worth mentioning here.
First, sticking to one's religion is so important a thing for everyone. Everything can be changed, but one's faith should be maintained. When we go to a totally new environment, we start a new life. We learn to be used to the customs there, we absorb the good things from another cultural system, but we should never forget our own.
Nowadays, with China's reform and opening up, more and more people go abroad, for various reasons, to study, to make more money, to realize dreams of childhood, or to see a bigger world. The outside world is colorful, we can learn a lot from it, but in my opinion, one should never forget his root. We Chinese people, should always remember and remind ourselves, whenever and wherever we are, that we are Chinese, we come from China, which located in the east of the world. We should never forget that, just like Shadrach never forgot his religion, even when he finished his “Americanization”.
Secondly, the story also proves that, differences between cultures are never barriers. Through cultural exchanges, we can learn from other's strength to offset our own weakness.
It is amazing that the author, who lived about 100 years ago, can wrote such a story that can tell us so much, in such a time of globalization.
Discussion 3: "Dead Men's Path" by Chinua Achebe
It's a short story, but the result comes out a little shocking. But after my second reading, I turned to think that it is so reasonable and comprehensive.
Different countries have different cultures and beliefs. I don't want to say too much about the fact that the Britain gained control of Nigeria at turn of the 20th century, for it happened long ago, in line with the times and the situations in that age. But the failure of Michael Obi shows obviously that if one wants to use one culture to cover or eradicate another, he will never succeed.
Nowadays, in a time of globalization, the cultural exchanges are no longer something fresh. Along with cooperation on politics or economic, cultural exchanges are developing rapidly. Not only statesmen but also ordinary people pay more attention and even take part in cultural exchanges. Through this short story written by Chinua Achebe, we can see that, diversity of civilizations all over the world should be cherished, though one can learn and absorb other culture to enrich or improve his own, the process of which is by no means one of simple imitation. And one can never try to eradicate another culture, as no culture should be taken as inferior and barbaric, people or country with different culture and beliefs should respect each other.
Discussion 4: "The Grass-Eaters" by Krishna Varma
The first feeling after I read this story is that, the author's writing is very exquisite, and at the same time, astonishing.
First, some descriptions are very vivid. For example, “a bag of bones” expresses a very thin person, “a hill of a man” indicates a man with a very strong body, and “whirling a tree over his head” describes one's hair in a mess. Those expressions are so fresh to me that exact images emerged in my mind as soon as I read them, which make the story much more real and vivid.
Second, the author's strain is special. Although it is a story with very poor people and lives, the author used an easy tone to tell it. “I lost the other (leg) after a fall from the roof of a tram.” No one may think that losing a leg is a small thing, but the author wrote about it, as if that's nothing serious. Maybe it is his own experience that made the author take everything easy, but in my opinion, write a tragic story in an easy tone, in a sense, can make the story more astonishing.