Author: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
9/28/10
In the column “Are You There God? It's Me Earnest” the writer describes an afternoon in a child's, Earnest, life after his family has moved to a new house. Earnest meets a girl neighbor who wants to play in the sprinklers with him. The day goes well, in an awkward six grader way until the girl scrapes her knee.
The use of short choppy sentences and simple diction reflect the simplicity of the story and the afternoon through the boys perspective. The short syntax is also consistent throughout the story and the reader is not drawn to any specific line because it varies, until the last two lines which are long and more thoughtful showing the progression of the afternoon. This is also where the boy returns to his thoughts about god.
A strength of this writing is the simple structure of the syntax and the simple word choice that makes it evident that this is from the perspective of a kid, because it makes the message simpler. The weakness is also that it is from the perspective of the child, because it requires that the reader look back at their life, and if they cannot make a connection meaning could be lost.
Through diction and syntax the author creates the persona of Earnest the young boy. This persona that she uses makes the story have more weight because that amount of faith from a child is more impressive. If it was coming from an adult, the simplicity of the day would be lost and the faith shown would mean very little.
The speaker would not be appropriate because the persona of a child is not a reputable source to pay attention to in terms of literary analysis.
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