Free Essay About The Metamorphosis Of My Perspective Through Literature

Literature has always been something that hogged my attention and interest right from a very tender age. I remember how my mother would read out the fairy tales to me when I was a child. As I grew up, I developed a strong interest in reading fiction. My parents would buy me some of the best books, while I would spend hours reading those books at a stretch. In retrospect, I believe that I have always been a very compulsive reader. Once I started reading a text and got hooked to it, I could just focus on anything else at all until I would finish reading the entire narrative.
Indeed, the habit of reading story books made me have an enhanced concentration, apart from catapulting my imaginativeness as an individual and vocabulary as a writer. If I am to judge, I would say that the writings of Franz Kafka truly left a very lasting impression on my mind. I remember, I was in high school then when I first read his story, The Metamorphosis. Reading this story, I understood how complicated human emotions and life are. I came to realize the subtleties of life and relationships as I went through the narrative. In fact, I remember with utmost clarity how the events unfolded in the course of the narrative of this seminal story.
Another very key text that left a mark on my mind was The Fly penned by the famous author, Katherine Mansfield. I was simply stirred by the subtleties of human emotions and expressions that were portrayed in this short story. Even hours after having read the narrative, I was left pondering about the emotions and actions of the characters in context. I could understand how sadism encompassed the minds of individuals and how people were engaged in a struggle for power hierarchy in a world that left them as powerless in front of fate. The killing of the fly and the satisfaction that the central character of the story extracted out of the act left me wondering about the nature and degeneration of humanity. It also made me think about the value of life in this temporal world. Now, these are two of the most stirring stories that I have mentioned here, but I went on to read a lot more.
Some lines penned by the famous literary artist, T.S. Eliot’s poem, The Hollow Men, have come to define my worldview over the years. The lines, “This is the way the world ends, / This is the way the world ends, / This is the way the world ends, / Not with a bang but a whimper.” I have been deeply bothered by the degeneration of the world’s society and the interpersonal dynamics in this society. I believe my writing reflects this perspective of mine in the most conspicuous manner indeed.
Now, I must say that I have truly enjoyed the experience of reading to the fullest. I have drunk the true elixir of life by drowning myself in the sea of emotions and imagination as penned by the stalwart authors of the world. I have loved reading novels, short stories and poems in the best possible manner. I still remember the lines of those poems that have left a lasting impression on the innermost core of my heart. With time, I came to know about the history of English literature and went on to read the writings of the most celebrated authors of the various eras of literary development in the world.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that all I have learnt about human life and society is from the books that are stacked up in the bookcase back at my home. I truly feel that Roland Barthes has explicated it correctly when he wrote that the text is a tissue of quotations. Whenever I sit to write a story, I understand how I am influenced by the many stories that I have read so far in my life. My imagination is the reflection of the expressions by the stalwarts of literary history and I am simply inspired by the genius and quintessence of their literary expressions indeed.
Apart from this, the memories of my life have also played a key role in shaping my psyche as a writer. I get immense happiness by penning my emotions and perspectives through the narratives of the stories that I write. I believe that the habit of reading fiction has also helped me in general writing as my vocabulary has got better with time and age. Hence, it would be correct on my part to opine that I owe it all to literature. I believe that it has shown me the proper path of betterment and personal fulfillment indeed. I wish to read many more texts in the times to come so that I can become a person with a much better insight and worldview. I would endeavor to gather the varied experiences of life and the world from the immortal pages of literature. I aim to write myself even more as it gives me immense pleasure and gives proper expression to the emotions of my heart. Thus, reading and writing play the key roles in my life and would always continue to do so in the future as well.