I have to say that I really enjoyed this reading. First of all, I loved Defoe's writing style. He is very detail oriented, but more impressive than his attention to detail is how he can still make the story interesting. I think Defoe pulls this combo off by adding in direct quotes from the people he was talking to and by adding emotion into the story. For example, at the end of the last story about the devout waterman Defoe admits to being so moved by the happenings that he cried. Second of all, Defoe really paints an amazing picture of a plague stricken town. The description of houses and houses full of dead bodies and wagons crashing to reveal mounds of dead bodies really left an impression on me-it's not so funny once you get the Monty Python imagery out of your head! All this carnage really made me wonder if people thought this was the end of the world. It seems that everybody is screaming that it is the end of days right now, but I wonder if every generation has thought the same way. I know I would have thought the end of the world was upon us if I lived during the plague.
Just a side note: Defoe's writing really reminded me of Poe. I'm not sure if it is just because they were writing around the same time period or what, but Poe has wonderful attention to detail and he added that fear and emotion in his work in order to scare people.
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The idea that the end of the world is here is a really interesting thought. Defoe's writing and the way he writes is very similar to the way people portray the world's situation today. There are so many people that are constantly saying that if we don't change the way we are living, than the world isn't going to last. Another thing we hear a lot is how we should prepare for the worse.
ReplyDeleteFood storage, guns, alarm systems, energy preservation, and hybrid cars are all examples of things we buy into. The reason we buy into these things isn't because the world is going to hell, because if that were the case the world would have gone to hell twenty years ago when people were still concerned about similar things. The reason why we buy into it is because these issues are presented in a way that seem real. Their talked about in the news, in religion, and in families. Well, Defoe's writing seems very much like news, or journalism. He leaves emotion out and gives all the details as if he was writing everything down as it happened write in front of him.