Letters From The Earth By Mark Twain Analysis

“For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:5). John Steinbeck’s work, East of Eden, is the one he considered to be his greatest, with all novels before leading up to it. Indeed, it grandly recounts the stories of the human race as told by the Bible, including Adam and Eve, but most prominently that of Cain and Abel. It touches upon both Steinbeck’s own family and a fictional family in a depiction of “man 's capacity for both good and evil” (Fontenrose). Joseph Fontenrose, however, criticizes Steinbeck’s message as contradictory and convoluted, with no clear relationship between good and evil.

1. Twain’s main purpose in “Corn-Pone Opinions” is to explain how human nature determines what is favored in the society. In paragraph 9, Twain states, “It is our nature to conform; it is a force which not many can successfully resist” (718). Since the birth, each individual are instilled with this conformity that cannot be ignored. Twain wants his readers to realize that the reason behind conformity is to obtain other people’s approval, even if the individual pretends to be someone else. Through his writing, Twain displays how people follow the trend because they do not want to be left out in the society.

In her article, “The Genesis of Gendered Subjectivity in the Divorce Tracts and in Paradise Lost,” Mary Nyquist examines Milton’s incorporation into Paradise Lost of the two Genesis accounts concerning man’s creation. In doing so, Nyquist seeks to determine, among many other things, Milton’s position on the balance of power in the relationship between Adam and Eve. She concludes that Milton’s use of the Genesis accounts places Adam in a hierarchically superior position to Eve. Despite the depth of Nyquist’s textual analysis, her argument is flawed for three reasons. First (briefly), her conclusion rests on Milton’s intention in presenting the creation story as he did in Paradise Lost; no amount of critical analysis will fully reveal the author’s intention.

In his essay titled “Corn-pone Opinions,” the famous American author Mark Twain explores the idea of public opinion and its correlation with human nature. Twain, known as the “father of American literature,” was particularly talented at observing and analyzing the people around him. He discusses corn-pone, or bland, opinions, and how they are a result of a lack of uniqueness and independence in people. According to Twain, trends in society are born from conformity, and die by the habits and opinions of outside influences, rather than the independent thinking Twain believes in.

There are many pieces of literature that describe the creation of the Universe. In the following paragraphs one will find that there will be two in particular we will be looking at. The first is The Iroquois Creation Story, and the second will be chapters 1-3 out of Genesis, the first book of the Bible. By the end of this essay hopefully one will be able to see most of the similarities and differences between the two works of literature. There are various similarities between the two works of literature, for example in the Bible in chapter 1 verse 1 of Genesis it states that “in the beginning God created the Heavens and Earth”.

I believe that Mark Twain’s purpose in “Corn-pone Opinions”(1923) is to illuminate his audience on the idea of how humans are so influenced on what they are surrounded by that they do not form their own reasoning. According to Twain “We are creatures of outside influences as a rule we do not think, we only imitate”(32). In other words, Twain is saying that people are creatures that search for influences in their surroundings. Therefore, mimicking is something that humans do instead of trying to develop an independent thought on things. Twain also writes in his essay, “He must get his opinion from other people, he must reason out none for himself; he must have no first-hand views.”(31). Twain’s point is that man gets his positions not from

It was that simple” (Cisneros 96). In comparison, the story of The Garden of Eden in Genesis consists

In The book of Genesis describes the story of Adam and Eve. However, in perspectives of the past presents two translations one is the revised stranded version of the Hebrew Bible the other is The Anglo-Saxon Translation. While they both have the same story the Angelo-Saxon Translation alters the story in order to represent their own values and beliefs. For example, the story emphasizes the wickedness of women. They go in great detail describing how the women was tricked by the devil to eat the fruit from the tree of death and how she made Adam eat the fruit.

It is noteworthy that this story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is the foundation of the religion with the largest number of followers worldwide. Why does it continue to resonate with so many people even today? The reason is that this utopia contains archetypes that reflect the collective unconscious that is found across all cultures. This is the result of universal themes in this story about humanity’s needs and desires that we still see occurring in our society today. The story of Genesis contains three archetypal characteristics that illustrate these patterns that still demonstrate humanity’s needs.

Mark Twain, an 18th century humorist, was known for his critical and satirical writing. In one of his most famous essays, “ Fenimore Coopers Literary Offenses” Twain addresses Coopers inability to realistically develop a “situation” and his failure to effectively back up his stories in order for them to be more plausible. To dramatically convey his unimpressed and sarcastic attitude, he applies biting diction, metaphors and hypophora throughout this work . By continuously using biting diction, Twain develops a mocking tone towards Fenimore Cooper’s incapability to create even the simplest of storylines. In the title of the work a sarcastic tone is evident; the word choice is utilized to reinforce the argument stating how Coopers work is an offense to the world of literature.

A twelve year old boy a world away from his parents once wrote in a letter to his parents: “And I have nothing to comfort me, nor is there nothing to be gotten here but sickness and death.” This child was Richard Frethorne, and in “Letter to Father and Mother,” he communicates his desperation caused by the new world’s merciless environment to his parents to persuade them to send food and pay off his accumulated debts from the journey. He accomplishes this with deliberate word choice and allusions to the bible to appeal to ethos, pathos, and logos. Frethorne uses diction, imagery, and facts to create a letter to his parents which aims to garner sympathy for his state of life and to persuade them to send food and pay off his debts.

Each other shows how their region is different in their writing; Twain compared to Jewetts’ has many differences in their settings and some comparisons as well. Twain’s setting is shown about his life on the Mississippi River and how he

Had the central power of the American government not been there to tell others that all who migrate into the country bring drugs, violence, and rape, there would not be an increasing demographic that believes it. In the same sense, if an author were to intentionally omit perspectives from writing in order to craft the image of a character, individuals would grow accustomed to that point of view and be adamant in its validity. This is what John Steinbeck is able to achieve in East of Eden, a modern retelling of Genesis’ Adam and Eve. Through the omission and inclusion of words and literary devices alike, Steinbeck is able to holistically create and mold reader perception. The incorporation and use of connotative diction, biblical allusions, and parallel structure throughout the novel of East of Eden is able to skew readers perspectives on the character of Charles Trask to picture him as an evil man, ultimately achieving the ability to create the image of Caleb Trask in the same form and plague him.

Particularly, Aubrey describes how the East of Eden letters evidently show Steinbeck’s interest in the biblical Cain and Abel story that seem to form the foundation of his novel. Furthermore, Aubrey discusses Steinbeck’s title ideas for his novel that bears emphasis on jealousy and rivalry between siblings. In addition, he explains Steinbeck’s philosophy and thought process writing that opposites like good and evil “cannot exist without the other” (2). In Aubrey’s words, the opposites of the world like good and evil have a relentless attraction to one another, for example, Adam’s moral nature falls for a devil like woman. Farther along in the article, Aubrey points out Adam’s

She then moves her focus onto Genesis 4:1-16, looking at the connection between Cain, Adam and Noah. The story of Adam contains Adam being formed out of the ground, and he will eventually end up back in the ground. The word “Adam” itself has roots that go back to the word “ground”, and Genesis links humanity to the ground by saying that humans essentially need to take care of the ground. This is shown in the case of Cain. Cain is a tiller of the ground, and Noah is a man of the ground, thus