Honors English II A: unit 5 test Essay questions answers: 1. The war and Nazism influence the works of many European writers including shorts stories and poems by Czeslaw Milosz and Eugene Ionesco. For example, the poem “And yet the books” by Czeslaw Milosz tells of how books will survive longer than humans through oppression, specifically that of the Nazis. Books will last to tell the truth about the past and are truly timeless objects. He describes that through human strife and turmoil “yet the book will be there on the shelves, ever born, derived prom people, but also from radiance, heights” (pathways 227). In contrast, the story “rhinoceros” by Eugene Ionesco, hints to Nazism by describing how many people in a city are turning into rhinos. As more and more people …show more content…
In the poem “A Contribution to Statistics” by Wislawa Szymborska, the author makes a statement about the overall opinion of humanity. For example she states characteristics “out of a hundred people” some of which are positive, others of which are negative. However, as the poem continues, the reader realizes that many of the negative characteristics outnumber the positive. For example, of those who are “cruel, when forced by circumstances-better not to know even ballpark figures” (Pathways 225). Of those one hundred there are those “righteous and understanding –three” (Pathways 226). However she ends the poem by stating “worthy of compassion—Ninety-nine” and “mortal- a hundred out of a hundred” (Pathways 226). The author’s overall opinion is that although people have many different characteristics and mix of both positive and negative, everyone has both flaws and merits that make them unique and human and that everyone at some point or time is worthy of compassion and kindness no matter what they are like. Through these examples, it is clear that in “A Contribution to Statistics” the author Wislawa Szymborska make a statement about humanity and human nature through them message of her