Writing Exercise #3
This writing exercise has three parts. Use this form to complete all parts and then submit it using the drop box in the Week 3 Module.
Part 1: What overlap in subject matter, theme, tone, voice, diction, mood, or meaning do you see between Denis Johnson’s short story “Car Crash While Hitchhiking,” which is the opening story of Jesus’ Son, and William Stafford’s poem “Traveling Through the Dark”?
The overlap between the two poems is felt, firstly, in the subject since both poems refer to the Vietnam war and losses sustained in it. Furthermore, these losses were on the personal and emotional level and that is why even voice, diction and mood are in a way similar. Indeed, both poems are sad and refer to some kind of experience that left and indelible mark on the narrator. Besides, it is worth noting that both pieces are written from the first person singular so that they both sound on the hand deeply self-centred, namely the focus is placed on the feelings that are in the narrator’s bosom and they both reflect the epoch as it was – full of losses and regrets.
Part 2: What differences in subject matter, theme, tone, voice, diction, mood, or meaning do you see between the same two texts?
Indeed, there is also difference between the two poems. The first one tells us about the narrator’s brother who presumably was killed in that war and that is why the narrator only ‘got a picture of him’ where he is in the arms of his beloved woman. Thus , the poem also refers to the topic of love which was nipped in the bud by the cruel war.
The subject matter of the poem has bearing on its tonality, voice, etc. Being sad, the poem also has some traces of patriotic notes in the last paragraph and even the reckless omes: ‘Born in the USA, I’m a cool rocking Daddy in the USA’. There is no inherent pessimism in the first poem as opposed to the second poem which is sadder and recounts about just the doe’s death but in such words that are deeply moving and present all the horrors of the war: ‘her fawn lay there waiting, alive, still, never to born’. Thre contast between the dead doe and its seemingly living fawn that is predestined to die is the incarnation of all horrors of the war.
Part 3: How do you think the narrator of “Car Crash While Hitchhiking” would react if presented with the situation in “Traveling Through the Dark” and vice versa?
It seems that the narrator of the first poem is less emotional and though he mourns the death of his brother, he is more likely to find something positive in the war linking it to patriotic feelings and Americanism. ASo presented with the situation of the dead doe he might have actually even not paid so much attention to it as the second narrator did.
On the contrary, had the second narrator found himself in the situation of the first, he would most likely couch it in the wotrds of the most profound mourning. And what is important these will be not mere words but the real feelings of the narrator. Probably he would not even focus on his brother’s love but in particular on his unfortunate death and details of it.
