Annie Dillard's Sight Into Insight

Every Christmas there was a massive dinner held in a seemingly never-ending dining hall. It was lavish and spacious with a table that was as long as a river and was decorated with many different table cloths and decorations. The ceiling of the hall was covered in chandeliers and the floor was filled with different groupings of people: the sick and injured, the children, to those who wanted to dance or participate in games or various others who gathered in separate sections throughout the hall.

In The Puzzle of Experience, J. J. Valberg argues that, concerning the content of our visual experience, there is contention between the answer derived from reasoning and that found when 'open to experience '. The former leads to the conviction that a physical object can never be “the object of experience,” while with the latter “all we find is the world” (18). After first clarifying what is meant by 'object of experience ', the 'problematic reasoning ' will then be detailed. Afterwards, it will be explained how being 'open to experience ' opposes the reasoning, as well as why the resulting “puzzle” cannot be easily resolved. Lastly, a defence of Valberg 's argument will be offered on the grounds that it relevantly captures how we understand our visual

In “Seeing” by Annie Dillard, Dillard argues that there is more than one way to see the world. To allow oneself to enjoy the simple wonders and life a pleasurable life, one must see the world properly. Dillard begins “Seeing” with a story from when she was young about pennies. How she would hide them, wishing and wondering about how later on they would be found by strangers. She continues to recount multiple stories about bullfrogs and darkness to emphasize the different ways of seeing the world and how it affects the observer.

The excerpt from the novel by James Elkins, “How to Look at Nothing,” describes what occurs to our vision when we are faced with nothing. The excerpt accurately describes a variety of phenomenons that happen to anyone when placed in the correct circumstances. It also reveals a lot about what how our vision can be askew. Our ability to judge and act on what we see is sometimes distorted by our own vision.

In the auto-biographical excerpt from Ornithological Biographies by John James Audubon, he depicts his intriguing encounter with the wild pigeons of Ohio, while in Annie Dillard's engaging excerpt from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, she illustrates her thought-provoking observation of the Starling roost migration. Both writers had an overriding passion that showed through in the diction, tone, and syntax of their pieces. Because of these different infatuations both authors use different literary devices that match their feelings of how they view the birds and how the birds affected them.

“The Chase” is about an adult chasing some kids, but Annie Dillard makes the story transition from throwing snowballs to “wanting the glory to last forever” and how the excitement of life at one moment can affect someone in the future to show that the excitement of life will always be there even when one is no longer a kid. The story starts with a group of friends, imagining how a game of football goes and continues with the encounter of a stranger. From throwing snowballs at his car to him chasing them till they couldn’t run anymore. The whole experience will change the way she looks at adults.

A world without culture, creativity, and connection is soul-less. There is a loss of some higher form of expression that separates a living human from a living shell of one. This form of expression can be caught in literature, music, and dance, but also in opposition, arguments and differences. To selectively avoid the negative side of this reality is to deny an important part of actually living as a human. This is why in the novel Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury’s use of connotations associated with machines and society against those associated with mirrors and nature in the work reveals how society’s rejection of unfair reality in favor of a false utopia of equality dehumanizes the population.

Within modern day society, there are many people who have eyesight cannot “see.” This sad truth is reflected within the husband who cannot connect with his wife because he displays a lack of insight. As the protagonist of the short story Cathedral, the husband had to undergo a certain change within the story in order to connect with his wife, who actually tends to be the antagonist. Through the usage of the husband’s language, behavior, and interaction with other characters–the author, Raymond Carver proves that it is possible to “see” once one accepts change.

The act of looking corresponds to physical vision, but in Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral” the act of seeing involves a much deeper level of engagement. The narrator is fully capable of looking. He looks at his house and wife, and he looks at Robert. The narrator is not blind and therefore assumes that he is superior to Robert. Robert’s blindness, the narrator believes, makes him unable to have any kind of normal life. The narrator is certain that the ability to see is everything and puts no effort into seeing anything beyond the surface. The only way he can break free from this artificial world that he has isolated himself in if he lets down his guard and surrenders his jealousy and insecurity.

In the story “Time of Wonder” the writer and illustrator Robert McCloskey creates a mesmerizing picture book. Throughout the book he relates his message to the reader of taking time to enjoy the weather and nature. Likewise, the reader is able to experience these events directly with phrases such as “IT’S RAINING ON YOU” (McCloskey 10). One event the reader is able to conjure up is the ocean in Maine with the taste of salt on their tongue. Moreover, the reader visualizes the calm sea on a sunny day and fears the roaring wind before a hurricane. Yet, McCloskey allows the viewer to feel “…pleased to see that the storm-flattened sunflowers are once more lifting faces to the sun” (McCloskey 58). All things considered, McCloskey writes a story that expresses the enjoyment that readers can feel towards the weather and nature.

In the works of Literature an epiphany is “a moment of profound insight or revelation by which a character’s life is greatly altered” (24). In the short story “Cathedral” Raymond Carver uses epiphany to draw on the theme, blinded views can alter someone’s behavior. On the realistic level, epiphany advances the plot and character development because they are the basis for the story’s central action. They also help define the narrator and play a vital part in revealing the story’s theme. The following changes in the character’s views have shown an evident development.

The experience of seeing for Annie Dillard (author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek) is not taken for granted. She fully understands the value and depth sight provides. To Dillard, “Seeing is of course very much a matter of verbalization.” She builds on this by saying, “Unless I call my attention to what passes before my eyes, I simply won’t see it.” This quote fully ecompases Dillard’s unique perspective on seeing. Seeing to her is a skill built on experience and knowledge. For this reason, Dillard uses the second chapter of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek to persuade her readers that seeing must be sought after. Dillard’s frequent use of imagery in nature and personal accounts merge to create her convincing argument.

Bazin argues "only the impassive lens, stripping its object of all those ways of seeing it, those piled- up preconceptions, that spiritual dust and grime with which my eyes have covered it, are able to present it in all its virginal purity to my attention and consequently to my love. By the power of photography, the natural image of a world that we neither know nor can know, nature at last does more than imitate art: she imitates the

Throughout the history of mankind many things have changed from environments to governments. However as these two writers, John James and Annie Dillard, have stated birds have always done the same thing as they migrate to wherever is comfortable. As these writers exclaimed their descriptions and effects there are many things that can be compared and contrasted within them. Descriptions from John and Annie were different from sound of the birds and the appearance of them but were the same when describing the flight of the birds, the effects were contrasted by John and Annie’s feelings but were very similar with the effect the birds motion had on them.

Renewed perceptions of ourselves of the world we live in is significantly entailed by discovery. Discovery may be unplanned, unexpected and confronting, as efficaciously demonstrated in Robert Frost’s ‘Stopping by the Woods on a Snowing Evening’. The pessimistic tone, correlating with prospective suicide, accentuates his loss of identity and value, behaving as a foundation upon which self-discovery can be achieved and thus offer new understandings of ourselves and the world we live in. Furthermore, this notion is vehemently exhibited in James McTeigue’s film ‘V for Vendetta’. The imprisonment of Evey, an epiphanic moment, acts as a catalyst for self-discovery, renewing her perception of herself and the world she lives in. Discoveries can induce