J.P. Williams
English Composition: 121
March 04, 2014
Owusu and the Crocodile
Owusu and the Crocodile
Once upon a time in Africa, there lived a little boy named Owusu. Owusu was eight years old and lived with his mother, father and grandmother. Owusu was an only child and his mother wanted to shield him from the harsh realities of life, as so many mothers do. She raised Owusu to believe that good things happen to good people and that life was fair and kind. Owusu believed this, even though his grandmother would insist that this was a foolish notion.
One day, Owusu went for a walk alone. He had been told to stay far away from the river, but as is often the case with children, this simply fueled his desire all the more. His grandmother had repeatedly warned him to be especially wary of crocodiles, as it was their nature to be crafty. Owusu wanted to see the traps that the hunters used in snaring crocodiles. Crocodile meat was tasty and their skin was used to make all sorts of beautiful things.
As he was walking along the river bank, he came upon a rather large crocodile that had become ensnared in a hunter’s net. Owusu had never seen a live crocodile before and stopped a moment to observe. The crocodile was struggling wildly. Owusu wasn’t scared, because he was usually a good little boy and he knew that bad things never happened to good little boys. The crocodile noticed him standing there and stopped struggling. She smiled, showing an impressive assortment of jagged looking teeth. “Good morning little boy.” she said, in a gravelly hiss that was rather disconcerting. “Good morning.” replied Owusu. Good little boys were always polite, even to crocodiles. “I was wondering,” she continued, “if you might be kind eno...
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... crocodile had been killed and the villagers were preparing to haul their trophy back to the village.
Suddenly, the boy’s dog spotted the rabbit and gave chase. Owusu tried to call him off, but by the time he had caught up to the dog, it was too late and the rabbit had been throttled. The rabbit was dying when Owusu carefully picked up its limp body. He sadly watched the rabbit in his hands, as it gasped its last breaths. Tears filled Owusu’s eyes as he whispered to the rabbit, “I’m sorry. The crocodile was right; this is the way the world is.”
Thesis Statement
Life is rarely fair or just, and the misguided innocence of a child does nothing to counteract this, regardless of how poetic it may seem.
(Possible conclusion to Thesis Statement?) in fact, exposure to the reality of life can be quite shocking and painful especially to someone blinded by gullibility.
The idea of the innocence having been created or forced to exist is lost as the poem focuses on the children and how innocent they are. This stands out particularly in the second stanza which uses end rhyme and repetition to underline just how many children seemed to be going into the church. It is also in that same stanza that the children are referred to as lambs, which is a common symbol for innocence. It is not simply the multitudes of children, but the multitudes of the innocent that have been gathered. ...
Throughout the book, it is shown that Robert has a special connection with animals and the environment. The many animals he encounters throughout the story are symbols which reflect on him and his actions. After Robert accidentally kills the German sniper who spared the life of him and his men, he feels guilty for taking an innocent life. This is reflected in nature by the bird which “sang and sang and sang, till Robert rose and walked away. The sound of it would haunt him to the day he died.” (Findley 131) This scene uses the readers’ knowledge of Robert’s deep emotional connections with animals to emphasize the sadness and guilt that he felt after shooting the German. Robert is often shown as innocent and caring, traits he shares with animals. Rodwell realizes this and draws a picture of Robert in his sketchbook (otherwise full of animal sketches), although “the shading was not quite human” (Findley 138). In the sketch, Rodwell is able to show both the human and non-human side of Robert. Finally, Robert’s strong love for Rowena, his sister, is mainly because of her innocence. As a result of her disability, she is innocent and naïve like a child or animal; she relies on Robert to be “her guardian” (Findley 10)....
Analyzing innocence has always been a difficult task, not only due to it’s rapid reevaluation in the face of changing societal values, but also due to the highly private and personal nature of the concept. The differences between how people prioritize different types of innocence - childhood desires, intellectual naivety, sexual purity, criminal guilt, etc. - continually obscures the definition of innocence. This can make it difficult for people to sympathize with others’ loss of purity, simply because their definition of that loss will always be dissimilar to the originally expressed idea. Innocence can never truly be adequately described, simply because another will never be able to precisely decipher the other’s words. It is this challenge, the challenge of verbally depicting the isolationism of the corruption of innocence, that Tim O’Brien attempts to endeavour in his fictionalized memoir, The
A child is known for having innocence, and bad experiences strip kids of it. In Sarah’s
Loss of Innocence is a classic theme in literature. Protagonists are forced into situations where they must sacrifice their goodness/what they believe. It is a theme that runs through both “ Young Goodman Brown” and “ The Most Dangerous Game”, though each of them happen in a different way.
Hard truth is uncomfortable to deal with; some cope with it with the approach of denial and anger.
The creature’s personality, or actions toward society, was displayed as being very calm and compassionate in the novel. He made many attempts to converse with society, but society feared and mistreated...
"Everyone is influenced by their childhood. The things I write about and illustrate come from a vast range of inputs, from the earliest impressions of a little child, others from things I saw yesterday and still others from completely out of the blue, though no doubt they owe their arrival to some stimulus, albeit unconscious. I have a great love of wildlife, inherited from my parents, which show through in my subject matter, though always with a view to the humorous—not as a reflective device but as a reflection of my own fairly happy nature.
...h him, because we do not truly know how he felt. We know that he felt unloved and that he cannot even face to love himself, whereas we have always received love from our parents and the creature never received this. He was always alone, he never even had a companion of his own species which had ‘the same defects’ .The creature does not want to be alive any more, as he does not love the world he lives in any more, and this is the world we live in.
Continuing with the thread of human development, we see the creature's acquisition of language. The creature most craves this sort of knowledge:...
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She allows the reader to identify with her by pointing out that she “went to the zoo all the time with [her] family” and that she “loved pandas” (Carr); the reader identifies with her, as the reader is likely to have visited the zoo as a child or likely to have a love for animals. Initially, she was very excited about seeing the animals so closely, but then she realized, even at that age, the “animals were miserable” (Carr). By telling the reader about her memory, Carr persuades the reader into believing that zoos are depressing and that animals do not belong in unnatural environments. Carr also mentions that she no longer goes to the zoo and urges her family and friends to do the same. The author then adds that she has a love for animals and wishes for the zoo animals to be set free. Again, by involving loved ones and reinforcing her love for animals, Carr appeals to the emotions of the reader. The reader is then likely to identify with the author, urge his or her family members and friends to not go to the zoo, and wish to see animals free from captivity. Therefore, Carr persuades the reader into believing that zoos are wicked by using the persuasive method of pathos. Along with Carr appealing to the reader’s emotions, she appeals to the reader’s
Society’s refusal to accept differences drives the creature toward violence. The standards of normal and abnormal are established at an early age, and no individual is left untouched. The creature, as a living being, has the right to be accepted and loved. However, the instant he tries to integrate in society, someone notices that he does not fit society’s definition of normal and revokes his rights. The creature tries to find food in a village to survive, and encounters a man in a hut: “He turned on hearing a noise; and, perceiving me, shrieked loudly, and, quitting the hut, ran across the fields with a speed of which his debilitated form hardly appe...
...fascination with the animal world. Children, they are permitted to love things they do not understand. But coming to these books as an adult, and loaded down with knowledge of their author’s life, with its longings and fears, one cannot avoid reading them as fables about E.B White’s own life” (Epstein 380). Reading about the tales and adventures of animals is different to a child compared to an adult. Children are fascinated with animals, but do not understand the hidden meanings, whereas the adults do. After knowing about White’s life it is easy to understand that these three books are pieces of his life that he is telling from a different point of view, the view of animals. White’s writing is an expression of himself (Sampson 530). “Hardly any literate American has not benefitted from his humor, his nonsense, his creativity, and his engaging wisdom” (Hasley 526).
Chinua Achebe’s short story “The sacrificial Egg” illustrates the life of a young African native Julius Obi, and the arising conflicts between two cultures. This short story takes place in a very small village in Africa, called Umuru in the mid 1900’s. This young African Native, although no native of Umuru finds himself trapped between his own culture, beliefs and the westernized culture. Although Julius has embraced the western culture, after certain events he eventually finds himself coming back to his own beliefs. Achebe, uses these two very different cultures to demonstrate the clash it produces in this young men’s life and, how no matter how hard he has embraced the western culture he was always going to go back to his own beliefs.