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September 22, 2005
Seeing by Annie Dillard
I have already read this passage once before in sophomore year of high school. Well, more specifically, attempted to read this passage because I don't believe I ever got through it. This time around, however, I did manage to get through it and I did like some parts! I feel that Annie Dillard can find words to describe the most minute and literally indescribable facets of nature and life, such as the color patches. A few parts I could relate and even got excited about, and others I found to be tedious and irritating. For example, I found her description of seeing the color patches after reading the book to be unbelievable and overdramatic. On the other hand, she makes up for it with the next sentences explaining she cannot undo her knowledge of the meaning of the forms she sees and her inability to "unpeach the peaches", which I thought was a great expression. She lost me on the very top two paragraphs of page 103 and how she can "see truly" when she blurs her eyes and looks at the brim of her hat. I just found the paragraph to be too wordy. I could appreciate it in a poem but too much is too much. However, there was one part I enjoyed and brought back memories for me and that is when she is describing how she is always on the lookout for antlion traps and monarch pupae and all things minutiae. It reminded me of how when I was younger I loved to go in my field and look for monarch butterfly catepillars and then house them with some milkweed in a small mesh bug "house" through the stages of eating, chrysalis, and hatching, then setting them free. It was always so exciting. Now, however, I can't find the catepillars anymore, though I am always on the lookout like Annie Dillard is. So I suppose this passage wasn't as tedious as the first time through, and yes, I did enjoy most of it.
Posted by lcisfreya at September 22, 2005 09:47 PM