The Santa Ana Wind In Joan Didion's Los Angeles Notebook
The authors, Linda Thomas and Joan Didion intersect and diverge from one another in the passages. They use moves in their writing in order to shape their message about the winds. Both “Brush Fire” and “The Santa Ana” have different purposes for the readers. The purpose of “Brush Fire” is to entertain the audience and the purpose of “the Santa Ana” is to inform the readers of the behavior and the mood of Santa Ana during these times. The authors use rhetorical devices like tone and
In the story, many things cause tension, there is definitely tension for the main character of the story, Esperanza. This story feels especially real, because it is loosely based on the author's life. The tension is first begun when Esperanza explains all the different houses
Larson uses figurative language to intensify the tone and inflict positive or negative feelings upon the reader. Larson describes the crushing devastation that accompanies Chicago’s trailing in votes for the opportunity to host the World Fair as “heavy and chill” (17). The metaphor comparing the city’s literal
In The First Betrayal Josan, a man who works in a lighthouse finds himself in the midst of a violent storm. Consequently the disheartening storm threatens to destroy the light in the tower, causing the ships to crash into the rocks. In the passage- The First Betrayal, Patricia Bray’s use of harsh diction and vivid imagery creates a mood of suspense. For instance, the author’s use of word choice illustrates a tone of fear.
Joan Didion uses rhetorical words in her essay “Morality,” to explain her reasons why she viewed morality as social, and established expectation. Didion starts her essay, by presenting emotional appeals to her particular setting. “As it happens, I am in Death Valley, in a room at the Enterprise Motel and Trailer Park, and it is July, and it is hot (Didion 106).” The significance in describing the setting is that it helps create a tone, such that it, evokes emotions of isolation, despair, and loneliness. After describing her setting, Didion states, “A word I distrust more every day, but in my mind veers inflexibility toward the particular (Didion 106).”
For example, when Jess, Eddie and Sam were in the abandon cabin they experienced an earthquake. The reader can sense the frightfulness they must have endured as trees tumbled down everywhere around them in the forest. The author also describes in detail how the heat from the blast felt so hot that every breath was like inhaling fire. Thankfully, Jess figured out that if she tucked her shirt over her mouth she could breath. This intrigues us to read on as the reader wants more details on what she is going through and how she survived.
Since it is ending, she switches from writing for the connection of the audience’s emotions, to providing actual information about the effects of the behavioral change. This is done in the last section by Didion to prove she did the research on why the storm affects people in Los Angeles and is not just giving her personal opinion. Therefore she switches from using emotionally sensitive words to more scientific words. For example in the first several sentences of the last section she states “ I did not know there was any basis for the effect… in which science bears… There is a number of persistent….
Through the use of literary devices such as figurative language, personification, and use of details, the author of The Street displays Lutie Johnson's relationship with the urban setting as overwhelming. Within paragraphs one and two there is a large amount of detail through word choice and imagery. Lutie’s overwhelming relationship is shown through the opening scene which is overflowing with imagery. The first thing the reader will imagine is an empty street with trash blowing around everywhere and a huge scary mess that is giving the urban scenery a very intimidating feel.
She uses descriptive nature as means to perpetuate the depressing mood. Victor then describes the condition of the trees in the area -where many of them are broken, destroyed or bent-emphasizing the severity of the scene. This reflects the beginning of the novel when Victor first encounters the powerful wrath of nature. At the age of 15, he witnesses a thunderstorm so terribly violent that “the thunder burst at once with frightful loudness from various quarters of the heavens” (22). The strength of the lightning was so strong that it struck and engulfed a tree in flames in Victor’s front yard and “reduced [it] to thin ribbons of wood” (22).
Ann Petry pens a stimulating expositional read in her 1946 novel, The Street. Running with the over-arching anticipated universal theme of vulnerability, Petry establishes Lutie Johnson’s relationship with the urban setting quite succinctly. Through her use of well-placed literary conventions, Ann Petry delivers a piece that will withstand the test of time. Petry establishes the wind as a symbol of an attacker to foreshadow Lutie Johnson’s violent future. From the very first paragraph, the wind is written ripping through the street, doubling over the pedestrians against its force.
The use of imagery in "Storm Warnings" conveys the literal and metaphorical meanings of the oncoming physical and emotional storms. Rich uses to imagery show the anxiety she is feeling about the storm in the beginning. For example, "The glass has been falling all the afternoon," and, "gray unrest moving across the land. " Both of these images have negative connotations, which show what she is feeling and what she sees.
The impact of the weather scene is a way to indirectly relate to the murder of Victor’s young brother, William. The author, Shelley utilizes weather to convey the Victor’s emotional feelings about the murder of his bother William. Through imagery in the quote, Shelley is able to utilize words to describe the weather relating them to both the storm and what has happened to our protagonist. To me, the flashes of light illuminate the lake which is his brother. William’s illumination is the light of his life is soon quenched when the author describes the “pitchy darkness”
With the setting and details laid out in front of the reader, Didion performs a tone shift, about midway through her essay. What once was an ominous, eerie description of human behavior during extreme weather, transforms into a methodical, scientific recount of the foehn winds and their occurrences over time throughout history. Didion’s now practical, instructive tone addresses the reasoning behind the events partaking in Los Angeles, with diction such as “malevolent”, “leeward”, “mitigating”, and “mechanistic”. Lastly, Joan Didion’s essay “Los Angeles Notebook” has a gratuitous effect on the reader. The entire purpose of the essay is to evaluate and deconstruct the effect of the environment on the human’s conscious and unconscious behavior.
Lutie, however, cooperates with the wind, reading the sign swiftly: “three rooms, steam heat, parquet floors, respectable tenants.” Asyndeton in Lutie’s case shows how she skillfully works with the wind to study the hanging notice. Literary devices such as personification, extended metaphor, imagery, and asyndeton show how Lutie masters the skills she will need in order to survive the challenges the big city, despite the hindrance
Another example of diction being utilized is shown when Bradbury wrote “angry sparks” and “tenderly crisping,” (Bradbury 3) to describe a fire that has begun
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