Blog Essay Class 3

Blog Essay:

This week’s readings take us on the paths of the afflicted, to places not likely traveled by most all who read about them. At points, the misfortunes lead to actual cringing and are such that you amass feelings of sympathy: for the foreign man on the ground, overcome by some spontaneous ailment and crowded by unhelpful onlookers; for the boy—self-conscious of, and ridiculed for, his destitution—who sleeps in cheap, mass-person quarters; for the Cuban rebel who is delayed briefly in meeting his death because of an error by the executioners; and for those who are judged by their appearance and class, as demonstrated by Jack London when he goes undercover, if you will, to see what life is like for the city of London’s poor.

These characters were made real through vivid imagery and, though relatively brief moments in time, through scenes showing struggles and triumphs. In bringing these people’s lives into ours, the authors are exposing us to intersubjectivity, or showing us what life is like from another’s perspective, be they rich or poor, gay or straight, male or female, and so on. In essence, we get a perspective on the Other, someone outside our self that we might ordinarily pass on the street without a second thought. It’s quite literally what Jack London does in The People of the Abyss, disguised as indigent while entering an area of London so impoverished that even his friends don’t want him to go.

Such intersubjective writing, I feel, is often the only opportunity the general public has of truly learning what life is like for the Other, especially when it comes to poverty. Statistics, for example, may tell us that X percentage of people are living below a poverty line, but no numbers describe what the boy in An Experiment in Misery experiences while walking down the street, being called a “hobo” and a “bum” simply for having a worn suit. When the night is mostly sleepless for him, I myself felt tired—and wished him a cozy, private bed on which to sleep.

Writing about poverty is indeed an important undertaking. It shines light on the bottom-of-the-barrel toilers who live in the very cities where many are well fed, sheltered, and clothed. And, regardless of Crane, London, or any other author’s intentions, the stories could bring legislative or philanthropic help.

I do admittedly struggle, though, with deciphering how much of the poverty is caused from external pressures, and how much is internal, helpable traits, such as laziness versus drive and determination. Plus, while certainly not a topic that should be ignored, the impoverished is an oft written-about topic, yesterday and today.

So I was pleased to read about unique, other Others this week: a man sent to the ground because of, assumably, a sickness, and a man who meets death, in the form of a firing squad, with fearlessness.

The story When Man Falls, a Crowd Gathers captured my sympathy the most. I wanted to actually plow my way into the crowd and drag the Italian man to safety. But, oddly, this writing focuses less on the man and child companion and more on the aroused crowd. It grows and grows as no one does anything to help—think duty-to-rescue law featured in Seinfeld‘s “The Finale”—and seems more interested in the unfolding drama than the man’s wellbeing.

But still, with the crowd and the eventual arrivals of the police officer, doctor, and ambulance, we get a good sense of the struggle forced upon the sickly man and can think of how the application has perhaps lasted into the 21st century. With today’s camera-phone technology, for example, we might expect something similar: Someone gets into trouble, and callous onlookers reach for their cell phones rather than springing into action. We can certainly assume few if none of the crowd members around the Italian man could have helped medically, but they didn’t need to make the situation worse by engulfing him.

And then we have the very vivid Death of Rodriguez, which includes the title character being shot by a firing squad. Here, we get a sense of the Other’s bravery and acceptance of death, even in such horrifying circumstances, because he seems almost careless about what is to befall him. I would argue that stories about Others’ deaths make for one of the better stories involving intersubjectivity, not for any type of social justice or commentary but in terms of death’s inevitability and no-return nature. In other words, though more complicated than Jack London simply changing his appearance, a poor person can keep trying to climb out of poverty and may get there, but death is death. So bringing forward such an experience that we all must face in some way or another strikes an unusual chord of universality.

Literary journalism and its techniques allow these stories to be told as they should, in a way that really explores the intricacies of a few moments in individuals’ lives rather than hunting for facts and quotes to plug in between. They allow for intersubjectivity and make us, as the readers, really get a grasp for what life has given Others outside ourselves. The Others experiencing hard times could be interpreted and broadened for some practical, real-world application, leading to a push for reforms in laws or the like. It could be argued that literary journalism even provides a more convincing avenue for such change because it attaches faces and emotions to what could be a broader problem, rather than relying just on numbers—10 percent poverty rate, 30 people executed in Cuba.

We see a real-world change come in the form of the Stead Act, which raised England’s age of consent from 13 to 16. The journalist behind it, W.T. Stead, relied heavily on the interviews, as literary journalists often do, to paint a vivid picture of scenes instead of detailing facts. The reader might be disinterested by such facts and figures, so good literary journalists, such as those discussed above, should be able to carry a reader by story alone all the way through. And by then, a true sense of the Other will likely have, in some way, conscious or not, entered the reader’s mind.

Passage:

From Death of Rodriguez: 

“It seems a petty thing to have been pleased with at such a time, but I confess to have felt a thrill of satisfaction when I saw, as the Cuban passed me, that he held a cigarette between his lips, not arrogantly nor with bravado, but with the nonchalance of a man who meets his punishment fearlessly, and who will let his enemies see that they can kill but can not frighten him.”

This passage stuck out to me because the writer, Richard Harding Davis, is really involving himself by depicting his own feelings as he’s witnessing another human being put to death. By not worrying about any exclusionary reporting rules, he’s able to illustrate the scene that much better, giving us an opportunity to feel as he felt.

Journalism Link:

An opportunity to get published: The magazine Creative Nonfiction is calling for submissions on “waiting.” From the website: “We’re looking for well-crafted true stories of delays, postponements, and pauses that explore and examine our relationship with time. “The theme is open to interpretation.”

Discussion Question:

When, if ever, do you find it appropriate to use “I” or “me” when writing a literary journalism piece, as Richard Harding Davis did?

The Flyers of the Daily Dusk

At daily dusk, an attraction of the world’s complicated evolution yet natural simplicity readies in man-made caves for the coming darkness. They, the attracted, the people, the families, the lovers, and the others, arrive early, for punctuality is key to witnessing this flash of God.

Inside the caves—or rather, the miniature barn houses on stilts—wake hundreds of thousands of Brazilian free-taileds, mixed in with a relative few Southeastern myotis and evenings. Bats, as the three collectively go by. They chatter in their primitive language, probably talking about more than we can know. It could be plans for their upcoming mission, the zooming and zigzagging through the night air, silencing the life of a great many vulnerable Insecta.

Though each mosquito gone is a human’s blessing, it isn’t their diet that captivates. Rather, it’s the sheer mass, exiting simultaneously, visible as an almost endless school of aerial fish. As the colony departs, groups stick together for some time, so many that ribbons can be seen dancing a mile out.

Visible and audible, the flyers can be felt, too. Not because of a crash—though they do veer from some tall faces just before impact—but because nature calls nature, most of the time with apathy for what rests beneath. The bombings clear a hole in the watching line. The weapons, pelting like raindrops, do no damage more than inciting giggles as the watchers scramble away from the impact zone.

The laughter mingles with the remaining human utterances of impression, ringing together like a guided tour meeting the aurora borealis for the first time.

It is often a question, whether the oohs and aahs are because this is their first encounter with such a dream, or if returning for a second, third, tenth means just as much.

Motivations aside, our time together is brief. The sun is gone, and with it escapes the bats, now scattered throughout all the land of moving cars, street lights, sleeping birds, intoxicated heroes, worried mothers, and vacant bat houses.

Your ears might catch a shriek from one of our small, flapping friends, when you’re on a porch at midnight praying for what’s next. But, chances are, the only for-sure shot you’ll get at visiting with these riders of the night is tomorrow, watching in line with your comrades in species, soaking in the wonders, the wonderful many flyers, of the daily dusk.