Analysis Of Ishmael By Daniel Quinn

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Ishmael is written by Daniel Quinn. It opens with the narrator pursuing the newspaper, coming across an ad looking for a student with a desire to change the world. This is the premise of the novel because it discusses topics about how the earth is deteriorating and its humanity’s fault. The problems Daniel Quinn tackles are the deterioration of the earth and its atmosphere, the mass extinction of many species of life, and the increasing insufficiency of the earth in providing for its inhabitants. The purpose for writing this book is to expose certain issues with the environment and the world as it’s related to human nature.
The audience for this novel is the general public, based on the expulsion of how man is faulted. The narrator questions …show more content…

Quinn essentially denounces prophets, claiming that they enforce arbitrary laws on how to live. By providing definitive models for life, prophets allow humans to ignore the more important laws of nature. Religion gives humans license to do whatever they please with the world, blaming the gods for any natural problems. This approach is also reflected in Ishmael's treatment of the Genesis origin stories, which he considers allegories for the more important conflicts between Taker and Leaver societies. Though he enforces this thinking to his pupil, he does in fact speak heavily of the gods who created the world in relation to society. "It's certainly not always unspoken. The religions of your culture aren't reticent about it. Man is the end product of creation. Man is the creature for whom all the rest was made: this world, this solar system, this galaxy, the universe itself (57).” Here, Ishmael criticizes this philosophy as dangerous. Man has evolved by belonging to the world, but Taker society has effectively relinquished the evolutionary process by acting as though humans are separate from the world. The hubris is more than unattractive; it also causes an imbalance between population and food supply that is spiraling the world towards imminent disaster. Another controversial aspect is the animalistic view on philanthropic quests to feed the hungry, which continues the problem of the increasing the population. Quinn presents his philosophy of life, through the character Ishmael, giving clear and convincing examples of its accuracy. He divides humanity into two large groups: the Leavers and the Takers (Quinn’s vernacular for “the primitive” and “the civilized”). Ishmael provides stimulating perspectives on humanity’s numerous creation stories, and offers alternative interpretations of well-known Bible stories, such as that of Cain and Abel. Ishmael argues that Cain, an agriculturalist and a Taker, killed

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