What Are The Similarities Between Somnambulist And How Not To Get Into College

The spoken word poem “Somnambulist” by Heron Jones and the essay “How Not to Get into College” both use figurative language to develop the theme that doing things that would make one successful, does not always result in happiness. In the poem, Jones emphasizes the use of a metaphor in the two lines, “our incentive is to keep wishing for raises, benefits, and bonuses. Dangling in our faces for a purpose of hypnosis.”(Jones, 40-41). Jones is comparing people wanting raises, benefits, and bonuses to a pocket watch. Dangling a pocket watch in front of an unknowingly hopeless civilian is used as a method of hypnosis. A civilian being hypnotized prevents them from being able to see past the pocket watch. The authors are trying to demonstrate how people are hypnotized to always

The essay explains how students in today's society, are willing to make sacrifices for them to be successful. Kohn explains how students are determined to,”squeeze out another few points on the G.P.A. or the SAT, in the process losing sleep, losing friends, losing perspective.” (Kohn, para.7). Students are aware that if they strive to work hard, there will be a good possibility of them being successful. Both of the works are similar in the sense that people strive to get a good education and well-paying jobs; no matter the sacrifices they would have to make. But in reality, they are not actually happy within themselves. In “Somnambulist”, Heron Jones uses repetition at the end of the poem to emphasize their emotions afterward. In the poem the author repeats the phrase, “Is this my dream or a dream that I’ve been living?” emphasize their frustration. The author has come to a realization that the things that they have been doing in the past, did not bring them true happiness. The issue is they were just interested in materialistic wealth such as money and lacked inner