Journal 2

1. How are the moths in the essay’s opening different from the moth at the campsite?  What do the different moths represent? 

The moths in the opening were just dried up corpses that had been eaten by a spider in the corner of the bathroom floor.  Unlike the moths in the opening, the moths at the campsite had been singed by fire.  The moths that have been singed by the fire are thought to have been doing something with their lives.  The different moths show different lives lived.

2. What lesson does the moth provide that Dillard takes back to her students? 

Dillard offers her students a lesson about going at life with all you have and taking chances.  The moths show her that she could take chances and make her own life interesting.

                                                                                         

3.  How many references are there to fire in the essay?  What’s the larger significance of fire in the essay? 

There at least three references to fire in the essay.  I think the fire symbolizes an element of danger in one’s life, or a life-or-death risk that someone takes.

4. Address how each of the following quotes connect to Dillard’s overall point.  

a.      “I would rather be ashes than dust!
          I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot.
          I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in        magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.
          The function of man is to live, not to exist.
          I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them.
          I shall use my time.”

                    -Jack London

Jack London’s quote is similar to the message Dillard is trying to send in that both writers want to live an interesting life and die knowing they have taken a chance and been extraordinary.

b. “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.”

          -William Butler Yeats

Dillard refers to fire many times during the course of her essay.  Dillard tries to teach her students the lesson that she has learned.   The “lighting of a fire” in Dillard’s case is the sudden understanding of life.

c. “A book should serve as the ax for the frozen sea within us.”  

          -Franz Kafka

Reading a book provides a reader with new knowledge and understanding: possibly, a new way of thinking.  It almost seems as if a book brings alive this sense within a reader, similar to how Kafka says there is a frozen sea within us.  It is also similar to how Dillard says you must go at life with a broadax.  I think it means you must look at life with a new understanding.