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7 comments:
I think that apart from the fact that it is a rhetorical question, Thoreau is able to support it efficiently. He is really trying to convince the reader to stop and think what he/she is doing. He is making us think about our current lives and make us question if we are happy where we are. His idea of life is very difficult for people to accept, since most of us run through life and don't speculate our surroundings. Why should we run, if we can go slow and really feel what we want to.
Thoreau in his rhetorical question is asking why do people hurry and want to rush their life's all the time. The question is answered through out the paragraph. At first Thoreau talks about how people are starved even before being hungry. This shows how people focus on the future so tensly that they forget about their present. Thoreau mentions about a men who said that people do as much as possible today so that they have time for tomorrow. This statement though is ironic becuase by living for tomorrow, a person is losing a today. Later, a farmer is mentioned about how instead of enjoying his farm, he is attached to the sound of the fire alert so that he can save as much of his farm in case of a fire.
There is another man who always takes half-hour's nap. When he is waked by another person, the man always ask's for the news. The next day when the man wakes up, he sees the news and it talks about a person being violently hurt. Why does a person wake up to just see or hear about these terrible news? Terrible news prevent people from going out and enjoying nature. So, a person sits in their house all day thinking about how to be safer in the future. Why stay home when there is life outside? A person should enjoy the things to be done when there is time to make it be done. In a popular movie called Kungfu Panda, it is said that today is a gift that is why it is called the present.
I agree with Norberto since he portrays the structure of Thoreau’s paragraph as I did. With the paragraph starting as a question, it pulls the reader into the thoughts of Thoreau, whether he/she agrees with him or not at the beginning. But with the support given by the metaphors and examples he gives (a stitch in time saves nine [sentence2] and the fire [mid paragraph]) he answers the question to the position he holds throughout the passage, which would be to live a simplistic life.
By starting a paragraph with a rhetorical question, Thoreau bases the entire paragraph on the single question. Yet, the author answers the question in a very convincing way for readers to understand what people are doing everyday and that today is not being appreciated enough. All the happiness that a single day can offer is being ignored and covered with other matters such as work and the global news. The perspective of life is based more on tomorrow and other subjects not pertaining to joy or the most significant factors.
Thoreau does a good job answering the question he asks, “Why should we live with such hurry and waste of life?” (3) He clearly answers that everyone is always trying to rush through life, always thinking about the future, instead of just living day by day enjoying every minute. Readers can conclude Thoreau’s basic answer for his question with his saying, “We are determined to be starved before we are hungry.” (3) With this saying he answers the question and then elaborates it later on with more examples and details.
I am so thankful for this website :)
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