DANCING WITH QUOTES: LOTF
Here are the quotes and analyses I created to demonstrate how to use flavor to establish tone and to show how to dance with a quote. Remember that when you dance with a quote, you have to use it, show it off. If your analysis does not actually NEED the quote, you didn't dance with it. Perhaps, you referenced it. Perhaps you sort of danced with a concept or a plot development. But to dance with a quote, you have to help the reader of your essay see her beauty and magnificence. Isn't that the reason we read wonderful literature to begin with?
NOTICE THE DIFFERENCE IN TONE IN THESE TWO EXAMPLES:
1. Jack’s freckles “disappeared under a blush of mortification” (23).
1. Jack’s freckles “disappeared under a blush of mortification” (23). Poor Jack has experienced such an extreme level of degradation. Unfortunately, he does not learn empathy from being so embarrassed his freckles disappeared. Jack does not seem to mind mortifying others, telling people to shut up, practically demanding to be chief and refusing to allow anyone to assist Simon after he fainted. Therefore, Jack does not deserve sympathy. As a matter of fact, his rather extreme reaction to disappointment should have served to warn naïve Ralph about the intensity of this boy’s ambition. Ralph should take notice rather than appeasing him.
1. Jack’s freckles “disappeared under a blush of mortification” (23). Golding’s hyperbolic description reveals Jack’s insecurity and fragility since a blush deep enough to overtake freckles must be intense. Jack’s blush, his mortification over the election, this silly “toy of voting,” along with Golding's description of his child-like “boney arm” raised foolishly and pointlessly in a reasonable but aborted effort to kill a piglet, serve as strong reminders that this bully does have feelings and should continue to be seen as a mere child despite the violence he eventually perpetrates (quote page number to be added).
I DID NOT PROVIDE MORE THAN ONE EXAMPLE FOR THE OTHER QUOTES.
2. Jack “trie[s] to convey the compulsion to track down and kill that was swallowing him up” (51).
2. Jack “trie[s] to convey the compulsion to track down and kill that was swallowing him up” (51). Golding’s personification of “compulsion” not only brings a terrifying concept to life but also suggests a size almost as large as the nonexistent beast that torments all the boys. For a compulsion to swallow up a whole boy makes Jack a morsel of food, miniscule, insignificant. Obviously, he could be no match for this psychological opponent either physically or intellectually. And once eaten, food is gone forever: therefore, when Jack can no longer resist his own private, metaphorical tormentor, he will likewise be consumed by this appalling compulsion. Jack’s fear indicates his understanding of and desperate need to fight against this force. At some point, there will be no returning to normalcy. Jack will be gone, eaten, with nothing left but the horrifying, hopeless need to kill. Jack should be admired, at least a bit, for recognizing and wanting to resist this insanity. And his companions should be ashamed for not paying greater attention to his small cry for help.
3. But “[t]his from Piggy, and the wails of agreement from some of the hunters, drove Jack to violence” (71).
3. But “[t]his from Piggy, and the wails of agreement from some of the hunters, drove Jack to violence” (71). According to Golding’s personification, Jack bears little responsibility for his reaction. After all, he was driven there like a passenger or perhaps a subordinate by the scolding of an outcast, a laughing stock, Piggy, someone utterly beneath Jack’s social station. Even some hunters, his own men, howled in “agreement” with Piggy. Such drastic mutiny could not be tolerated by one so amazing, someone who had just brought highly coveted meat. Through this personification, suggesting a certain, subtle victimization of Jack, Golding reveals how outside forces continue to take him prisoner.
NOTICE THE DIFFERENCE IN TONE IN THESE TWO EXAMPLES:
1. Jack’s freckles “disappeared under a blush of mortification” (23).
1. Jack’s freckles “disappeared under a blush of mortification” (23). Poor Jack has experienced such an extreme level of degradation. Unfortunately, he does not learn empathy from being so embarrassed his freckles disappeared. Jack does not seem to mind mortifying others, telling people to shut up, practically demanding to be chief and refusing to allow anyone to assist Simon after he fainted. Therefore, Jack does not deserve sympathy. As a matter of fact, his rather extreme reaction to disappointment should have served to warn naïve Ralph about the intensity of this boy’s ambition. Ralph should take notice rather than appeasing him.
1. Jack’s freckles “disappeared under a blush of mortification” (23). Golding’s hyperbolic description reveals Jack’s insecurity and fragility since a blush deep enough to overtake freckles must be intense. Jack’s blush, his mortification over the election, this silly “toy of voting,” along with Golding's description of his child-like “boney arm” raised foolishly and pointlessly in a reasonable but aborted effort to kill a piglet, serve as strong reminders that this bully does have feelings and should continue to be seen as a mere child despite the violence he eventually perpetrates (quote page number to be added).
I DID NOT PROVIDE MORE THAN ONE EXAMPLE FOR THE OTHER QUOTES.
2. Jack “trie[s] to convey the compulsion to track down and kill that was swallowing him up” (51).
2. Jack “trie[s] to convey the compulsion to track down and kill that was swallowing him up” (51). Golding’s personification of “compulsion” not only brings a terrifying concept to life but also suggests a size almost as large as the nonexistent beast that torments all the boys. For a compulsion to swallow up a whole boy makes Jack a morsel of food, miniscule, insignificant. Obviously, he could be no match for this psychological opponent either physically or intellectually. And once eaten, food is gone forever: therefore, when Jack can no longer resist his own private, metaphorical tormentor, he will likewise be consumed by this appalling compulsion. Jack’s fear indicates his understanding of and desperate need to fight against this force. At some point, there will be no returning to normalcy. Jack will be gone, eaten, with nothing left but the horrifying, hopeless need to kill. Jack should be admired, at least a bit, for recognizing and wanting to resist this insanity. And his companions should be ashamed for not paying greater attention to his small cry for help.
3. But “[t]his from Piggy, and the wails of agreement from some of the hunters, drove Jack to violence” (71).
3. But “[t]his from Piggy, and the wails of agreement from some of the hunters, drove Jack to violence” (71). According to Golding’s personification, Jack bears little responsibility for his reaction. After all, he was driven there like a passenger or perhaps a subordinate by the scolding of an outcast, a laughing stock, Piggy, someone utterly beneath Jack’s social station. Even some hunters, his own men, howled in “agreement” with Piggy. Such drastic mutiny could not be tolerated by one so amazing, someone who had just brought highly coveted meat. Through this personification, suggesting a certain, subtle victimization of Jack, Golding reveals how outside forces continue to take him prisoner.