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Abigail Adams Letter To Her Son Rhetorical Devices

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In this letter to her son, Abigail Adams justifies her thoughts on life and reflects them onto him. Out of the many, two rhetorical devices that ultimately led back to her main purpose really stood out to me. Overall, Adams uses several rhetorical devices that ultimately makes her purpose and evaluations extremely clear. Furthermore, making her stance stronger. In lines 40-45, Adams concludes how to retain wisdom by revealing the meaning of wisdom itself. She explains that experience is needed. Adams reveals to her son that “wisdom and penetration are the fruits of experience, not the lessons of retirement and leisure.” In this quote she uses personification to illustrate a mind picture of her purpose by comparing fruit to wisdom. Basically
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In the year of 1990 Mary Ewald, a concerned mother, wrote a letter to Iraqi president pleading for the return and release of her son Thomas. Throughout her letter Mary Ewald uses several rhetorical devices. Ewald makes appeals to ethos by stating she and her husbands credentials, she evokes emotion by discussing religion and her son, and she provides logical evidence with detail. Even though the mother is emotional she is able to write with intelligent diction and doesn't reveal a pleading tone until the

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The meaning behind a mother’s advice to her children should be taken to heart. Despite John Quincy Adams’ young age, Abigail Adams presents him didactic advice to assist him in his future endeavors. Abigail Adams employs various rhetorical devices to support and expound on her advice; she tells John Quincy Adams to not waste the advantages he was doled in life and mentions how wisdom lies in experience thought the implementation of personification, extended metaphor, maternalistic diction, and allusion. Abigail Adams advice focused on John Quincy Adams applying himself and emphasized how he must take advantage of the privileges he has received.

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Many people and or things were effected during the American Revolution. This is the time Abigail Adams wrote a letter to her son who is going on a trip with his father. In this letter she gives her son some advice like making mistakes in life to making your own path. Adams provides examples to help illustrate these ideas better.

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440 Words | 2 Pages

Adams uses an abundance rhetorical devices in her letter to her son. The strong diction illustrates what challenges must be faced to become a hero. This tells John Quincy Adams that it will not be easy, but it is worth it. The analogies compare a traveler to a river and wisdom (or fruit) to experience and laziness.

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812 Words | 4 Pages

Every mother wants what the best for her child, even if that child may not believe so. In her letter to her son, John Quincy Adams, Abigail Adams addresses him during his travels in France and defends the rationale of her previous advice while providing her new advice, and partly demands, on the subjects of honor and duty. Abigail Adams uses emotional appeals in the form of personal repetition, flattering metaphors, and prideful personification in order to advise and persuade her son in his personal growth and appeal to his personal qualities, such as pride of honesty and knowledge, to spur his ambitions and actions. To start off the letter, after greeting him and explaining the occasion of her writing, Abigail uses personal repetition with the word “your,” before qualities and events with a positive connotation to appeal to John’s pride and leave him open to listen to more of her her advice, as she already successfully advised him in his trip to France. In only the second sentence of the letter, Abigail already throws in that her advice is, to John, “for your own benefit,” (5) later she speaks of, once again to John, “your knowledge,” (11) and finally, “your understanding,” (14).

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Letter to Her Daughter from the New White House Abigail Adams does not like the new White House because it is unfinished, The City is surrounded by tree’s, and The buildings in the city aren't pleasant. The first reason that Abigail Adams does not like the White House is because it is unfinished. From the text “ There is not a single apartment finished, and all withinside, except the plaster, has been done since Briesler came.” This is my evidence because it shows that she does not like that the apartments and plastering is not done.

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987 Words | 4 Pages

A twelve year old boy a world away from his parents once wrote in a letter to his parents: “And I have nothing to comfort me, nor is there nothing to be gotten here but sickness and death.” This child was Richard Frethorne, and in “Letter to Father and Mother,” he communicates his desperation caused by the new world’s merciless environment to his parents to persuade them to send food and pay off his accumulated debts from the journey. He accomplishes this with deliberate word choice and allusions to the bible to appeal to ethos, pathos, and logos. Frethorne uses diction, imagery, and facts to create a letter to his parents which aims to garner sympathy for his state of life and to persuade them to send food and pay off his debts.

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604 Words | 3 Pages

In this letter, Abigail Adams writes to her son John Quincy Adams who is abroad with his father. Later, John Quincy Adams, will be noted as a United States diplomat and president. In this letter, Abigail Adams addresses her son, offering him advice for the future. She asserts the pride she has in her son and all that he has accomplished. She encourages him to grow and expand his horizons of knowledge.

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She uses this rhetorical strategy to connect with her son and show affection. Throughout her letter Adams says "My son". She states this multiple times to clarify that this letter is not to scold him but to guide and inform him. By Adams continually emphasizing support for her son,

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596 Words | 3 Pages

To start off, Abigail Adams appeals to her son’s emotions by starting off the letter with “my dear son.” By using this introduction, it informs her son that she is being sincere and affectionate towards him. She, also, uses the power of ethos by flattering him with the talents and triumphs he is set with. This is exhibited in the third paragraph when she insists that he is bestowed with “superior advantages.” This flattery persuades and encourages him into continuing his use of the set of advantages he has received.

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She asks her son rhetorically if Cicero would have been such a great leader had he not been "roused, kindled and inflamed. " Here, Adams is explaining that to become a great leader, one must go through great trials. Also, Adams compares her son to

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495 Words | 2 Pages

Abigail Adams, the mother of John Quincy Adams, is entering a new chapter in her life in which her youngest son is becoming a man. John, his elder brother, and his father are traveling on a long, treacherous voyage to France. Abigail Adams writes John an encouraging letter that will help display her feelings towards him as a mother. Adams uses a number of different rhetorical devices such as a myriad of different historical and metaphorical examples, as well as a motherly diction in order to leave a desired confidence in her son.

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Abigail Adams in the letter to her son, John Quincy Adams, suggests that he be brave and a great man. Adams supports her suggestion to John by explaining what he should do and that he should be strong, mentally, on the trip. The authors purpose is to encourage the son to be a strong man in order to last on the trip, do honor to their country, and become a great man in the future. The author writes in an inspirational tone for her son John Quincy Adams. She incorporates many different literary techniques in order to get the mood and tone across to her son.

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678 Words | 3 Pages

Abigail employs strategies of emotionally charged words and phrases that only a mother can say to her son. In her letter she opens the letter with the phrase, “MY DEAR SON”. This phrase is notable because of the effects that it is intended to give to the audience, her son John Quincy Adams, she is setting a mood and tone of a loving and compassionate mother. She is using the position of her authority as his mother to push him her love for him is why she knows this trip is great thing for him.

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452 Words | 2 Pages

Abigail Adams uses rhetorical devices such as pathos and allusion to get her advice to her son John Adams. Adams uses pathos throughout her letter to show the support and tender love a mother can have for her son. Adams wants to let her son know that he has a support system from his family when adversity comes at him in

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