2220/2200, Intro to Fiction & Intro to Literature —
Student Final Exam Sample Papers
The student essays below are meant as rough guides as you begin work on your own paper. Please note that these essays are not "perfect" (whatever that may mean) and could variously be improved upon. Still, these samples are by and large well written; they feature a clear and interesting thesis and, each in their own way, makes a series of strong points by enlisting suggestive evidence from the text. Thank you to your fellow students for allowing us to have a glimpse at their work!
Sample 1: The Song in Poetry
This essay is a developed
argument that evolved out of a discussion about poetry and
music in ENGL 2200. There seemed to be a great amount
of tension when a fellow student suggested the theory that
song lyrics could not be poetry, but were a different genre
all together due to the addition of the tonal qualities
mapped out in the music. I found this an intriguing
phenomenon and subsequently it inspired the argument in this
essay.
From the very beginning of
humankind, when we stood up on two legs and walked our way
out of the Great Rift Valley and struck stone to spark- from
the moment we made our first families, and sat around the
fragrant smoke of the warming glow, our species made
connections. From small grunts and groans, to
patterned syllables and symbolic associations, we attached
our will, our desires and griefs to words and rhythms.
From these we gained the communicative power of language and
separated ourselves forever from the beasts of the
grasslands, and primates of the canopy above. Somewhere
along the way, we felt it necessary to preserve the
development of this new language, and the culture that was
developing progressively with the evolution of our minds.
The thoughts that creatively spewed from our growing
intelligence painted pictures, took snapshots of time and
ideas, and developed passions and philosophies that would
make our species king of the planet. All this history
of remembrance was made possible by the oral traditions of
our ancestors; storytellers became the shamans of our
intellectual memory and preservation.
The truth is, we as a
species need a way to not only express ourselves intimately,
but we long to put into stone for our descendants some sort
of intellectual, emotional and spiritual roadmap that
exposes us for who we are, and implores our posterity to
strive toward greatness. Maybe it is a chance to say,
“live life to the fullest” or maybe more to the tune of “hey
stupid, be better than I was”. Much like the physical
evolution our species has taken over the space of countless
millennia, our inner selves have developed the ability to
learn from our mistakes, change our tune and seek to find
that perfect harmony between the physical and emotional.
This is where our literary beginnings erupt; histories
become stories, imaginations become novellas, love and loss
emerge in poetry, and when words cannot say enough, they
combine with melody in the heavenly communion of music.
Although music and lyric
are often the expression of our inner most thoughts, fears
and desires (the very essence from which a poet draws
his/her inspiration), it has been on the hot bed of
discussion concerning whether it should be included in the
literary realm of poetry or separate from the genre
completely. The argument seems to consist of the contrast
between the verbal forms found in literature, and the
combination of music and lyrics in song. This suggests that
when musical elements are added to poetry it becomes
something different altogether, evolving from a literary
form to a distinct and separate art form. As you might have
guessed, this is a conversation that can turn ugly when
strict guidelines are imposed on the eloquent freedom of
poetry.
Perhaps the definition of poetry
is something that needs to be explored? Perhaps the very
existence of poetry as a literary device suggests that there
should be no restrictions regarding how poetry should be
constructed, read or listened to? According to the ancient
Greeks, “poems rely for their effect on imagery, word
association, and the musical qualities of the
language used”. The Oxford Dictionary defines poetry
as, a “literary work in which the expression of feelings and
ideas is given intensity by use of distinctive style and
rhythm; poems collectively or as a genre of literature”.
Dictionary.com defines it as, “the art of rhythmical
composition, written or spoken, for exciting pleasure by
beautiful, imaginative, or elevated thoughts”. Each of
these definitions elude to the musicality found in poetry.
Words like: rhythm and composition are synonymous with music
and composition and would seem according to these
definitions to be integral parts of the literary form.
When we consider the musicality
of poetry, we might reflect on the work of literary masters:
The lyrical beauty of the poems of William Blake, the love
sonnets of William Shakespeare or the earthy grit of Bruce
Springsteen’s ballad, Nebraska. The work of each of
these artists have one, distinct commonality: rhythm.
It is the primary characteristic in poetry that leads,
directs or drive us toward the heart of the thing.
Without it, all would seem to stop: music would be a
formless, ambiguous chaos – poetry would deny it’s maker,
and the heartbeat of human feelings would be out of sync.
Some may suggest that poetry is
music, and music is poetry; that they share in commonality
that one distinct quality of rhythm. For instance,
slam poetry leads us through the mind and heart of the
writer, using the companionship of rhythm and the human
voice to tell the story in a punctuated ebb and flow. The
great folktales of past and present have been penned to
coexist with music, making them more available to the
public, and palatable to the masses. The hymns that
echo throughout the cathedrals of the world signal communion
between the body and eternal spirit. All of it the
expression of ideas. All of it for the effect of
imagery, the association of words and the manifestation of
the spirit. All of it poetry!
The great American songwriter,
and winner of the Nobel prize for Poetry, Bob Dylan, has
taught us for 5 decades through his songs. His lyrics have
stirred the hearts and souls of generations, calling us to
the arms of peace, and exposing our most intimate secrets,
desires and sins. Stripped of the melodies and musical
accompaniment, his words are powerful and eloquent, simple
and advanced in tandem. But combine them with melody
and musical accompaniment and they unite to create a poetic
expression of enormous power. They gain a strength and
courage that cannot be denied nor soon forgotten.
Poetry can be a liberating and
uniquely satisfying expression of self and the communal
elevation of the masses. Leonard Cohen, another great
musical poet once said, “I think poetry is a verdict.
It’s a verdict that we give something that moves us…that has
authority, and music, and resonance”. If poetry is indeed a
“verdict”, if it is something that moves us, exposes us from
the inside out, and establishes a resonant authority, we
should not be too willing to constrain its form, or too
quickly label it. Instead we might open the damn and
let it freely flow, allowing it to make its mark as it
rushes out from us; all the while giving it the freedom to
travel its meandering course and affect all those willing to
receive it in whatever form it chooses.
The opinions will be vast, and
debates will continue. But, if we defiantly separate poetry
from song, we divide up the strength of these art forms and
dilute them down to a mere fraction of their united potency.
After all, isn’t the power of synergy greater than the sum
of the parts?
Sample 2: The Battle of Crickets and Cultures
When an individual moves to a new country, they are often faced with adapting to an environment and culture that is completely foreign to them. In the text A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain, Robert Olen Butler candidly portrays the hardships and trials his characters experience when faced with the task of crossing into a new culture and way of life. The short story entitled "Crickets" is an excellent example of a Vietnamese man struggling to adapt to his life in America. The main character, Thieu (Ted), often feels powerless in many areas of his life. He feels powerless at work, because of his size, and powerless to save his young son from becoming completely Americanized.
Thieu was a man who was born and raised in Vietnam. When he was just 18, Saigon fell. He and his new wife fled to America. When the couple first arrived, the outlook was positive. They were living in a place that reminded Thieu of Vietnam. He says, "We ended up here in the flat bayou land of Louisiana, where there are rice paddies and where the water and land are in the most delicate balance with each other, very much like the Mekong Delta, where I grew up." It seems as if he is going to try to make the best of this new place and culture. He even goes to work in order to become "the best chemical engineer they’ve got" at his place of employment.
However, life is still a struggle for Thieu. While he is extremely successful when it comes to his job, he still feels bitter and frustrated at times. Even though his name is Thieu, his coworkers call him Ted. Ted says that, "They call me Ted where I work and they’ve called me that for over a decade now and it still bothers me…" The previous sentence is the first line of the story and is where the reader is first exposed to the trials Ted faces as he is attempting to cross cultures. I don’t believe Ted is so bitter because they don’t call him by his given name. He even states that his name is relatively common in Vietnam. However, I feel like he feels he is losing a part of himself and his culture as his name fades into the background. Although those he works with are the ones responsible for calling him Ted, he’s not angered towards them. He says that "They’re good-hearted people, really…These people who work around me are good people and maybe they call me Ted because they want to think of me as one of them..." You get the feeling that Ted is tired. Possibly to the point where he realizes that his culture isimportant, but it’s fading away slowly.
Another source of agitation and frustration for Ted is his small physical stature. Everyone is larger in size than he is. "I am the size of a woman in this country and these American men are all massive…" I think that his size makes Ted feel powerless and inadequate. It’s as if everyone is just a step above him. Being small makes him feel incapable of being a true success. If he were still in Vietnam, he probably wouldn’t be having these particular feelings. However, since he has crossed cultures, the feelings of inadequacy seem to come more often than not.
Perhaps the situation in which Ted feels most powerless is with his son. His son, Bill, is extremely Americanized right down to his true-blue American name. Bill knows very little about Vietnam and his parents’ culture. He was born in America, he is an American, and America is all he’s ever known. Regarding Bill, Ted says that "He is proud to have been born in America, and when he leaves us in the morning to walk to the Catholic school, he says, "Have a good day, y’all." Sometimes I say goodbye to him in Vietnamese and he wrinkles his nose at me and says, "Aw, pop," like I’d just cracked a corny joke. He doesn’t speak Vietnamese at all and my wife says not to worry about that. He’s an American."
While Ted understands the importance of his son living an American life and having the American lifestyle, he still worries about the situation. It is because of this worry that Ted tries to impart a little Vietnamese culture into Bill ’s life. He begins to tell Bill about the "fighting crickets" he played with as a young boy in Vietnam. In order to appeal to his young son, Ted calls the game he is going to explain "Cricketman." He gives the game a superhero name in order to spark and hold Bill’s interest and attention. Ted explains to his son that there are two special kinds of crickets to be used in the fighting game. There are the big and slow charcoal crickets, and then there are the small and smart fire crickets. When Ted describes the crickets, it is as if he is describing himself (the fire cricket) and the Americans he’s around (the charcoal crickets). He says that "There are two types, and all of us had some of each. One type we called the charcoal crickets. These were very large and strong, but they were slow and they could become confused. The other type was small and brown and we called them fire crickets. They weren’t as strong, but they were very smart and quick." Like any young boy, Bill is curious about who usually wins the fight. Is it the slow cricket or the fast cricket? Ted explains to his son that the fights between the crickets were tough and lasted a long time. Ted says that either type of cricket could be victorious. The main point he emphasized was that the fight was a "struggle." I think that Ted’s use of the word "struggle" is reflective of his struggle and fight right here in America. He struggles with his name, his size, and trying to teach is son about Vietnamese culture.
Ted and Bill begin their search for these "fighting crickets" around their own house. Disappointingly, they can only seem to find the big, slow, charcoal crickets. They search and they search, but that is all they find. This simple thing is devastating to Ted. He says, "I was actually weak with disappointment because all six of these were charcoal crickets, big and inert and just looking around like they didn’t even know anything was wrong." I think this thought Ted has really reflects the struggle he is having in the American culture. I think that is how he sees Americans; "big and inert." Maybe he feels that even though he is living in this country with so many people, he is still lost and no one even notices. While he sits lost in his sad thoughts, I think some of the disappointment also stems back to the fact that he is so small. He epitomizes the small cricket, the underdog, and they couldn’t even find one of his kind. That must be how he feels from day to day. This place he lives in is, of course, completely influenced by the American culture. Ted truly does understand that it’s important that Bill lives and progresses in America. However, he himself feels stunted, stifled, and suffocated.
Bill notices that there is dirt on his running shoes and hurries inside in order to get them cleaned. In a final act of desperation, Ted begins digging deep holes trying to find some of the small crickets. However, he has no success. He continues to uncover only the big charcoal crickets. It seems that at this point he has hit the lowest point while trying to make it across the cultural gap.
Then he has an epiphany of sorts. He thinks to himself, "In Louisiana there are rice paddies and some of the bayous look like the Delta, but many of the birds are different, and why shouldn’t the insects be different, too? This is another country after all." I think this is a turning point for Ted. He realizes that while America is different, and there aren’t many crickets like him around, he might just have to adjust. He understands that his Vietnamese culture is still important and knows that the small crickets are still very "precious and admirable." However, I think he is taking steps to embracing his new culture. His first admirable step towards this adjustment comes when his son is leaving the house. Ted watches him run out the door and then simply calls after him, "See you later, Bill." Nowhere else in the story do you hear Ted call Bill by his first name. It is as if Ted is starting to accept the way things are is trying to make the best of his situation as he narrows the gap between his two cultures. Right at that moment, I think Ted has all the power he’ll ever need.
Sample 3: Gattaca and Free Will
The 1997 film Gattaca, written and directed by Andrew Niccol, raises several important philosophical questions. The heart of the film’s plot is about a world in which genetic makeup determines one’s social and economic standing in a society of the not so distant future. But a deep metaphysical question is present in the story: that of free will versus determinism. What does Gattaca do to make the argument for free will?
The film is obviously in favor of the idea of free will determining our destiny. The main character’s name of Vincent Freeman instantly strikes the viewer and allows the audience to see that this is a man driven by his belief in free will. "There is no gene for fate," Vincent says. Rather than becoming resigned to fate, he instead chooses to defy his own genetics that mandates him to lower income jobs. Vincent is a dreamer, and a very driven man, going so far as to adopt another person's identity to achieve his goals. Ultimately this identity change is in the spirit of the so-called "American dream"---that with hard work and determination Vincent can become what he wants, although his willingness to illegally take the false identity of another (foreign born) person deflates this dream. Vincent ironically is a Horatio Alger-like "rugged individualist," and yet at the same time depends on a small network of people to keep him working for Gattaca and his identity a secret. Vincent never comes off as a sellout however; his strategies are merely a way of overcoming an increasingly prejudicial society.
The film also shows the victory of free will over determinism again in the romantic subplot between Vincent/Jerome and Irene. Irene is an obsessive over standings in society based upon genetic records, going so far as to review Vincent’s in great detail and coming to the conclusion that it is flawless. It would be easy to see why someone who places so much emphasis on this standing would harbor romantic feelings for a "superior" person. However, as the movie progresses, Irene learns Jerome is not who he says he is, that he is an "invalid" impostor. Her feelings remain the same, though, and in doing so she is freely (though perhaps not altogether consciously) rejecting the predetermined social order and her own highly ingrained belief system by falling in love with an invalid.
The character of Eugene presents us with an interesting set of metaphysical questions. First and foremost, Eugene is a gifted individual. We are told he has "an IQ off the register" and that he has the "heart of an ox." However, in voiceover, Vincent tells us that, while being an extremely gifted (and well engineered) member of the elite is a definite advantage, it is "by no means guaranteed." Eugene has fallen on hard times, and what seems to be the most relevant argument for free will in this film, he appears to be on hard times because of his own choices.
In the past, he deliberately stepped out in front of a car. The impression is given that those around Eugene believe he was drunk and that it was an accident. But Eugene tells us he "had never been more sober in my life." Eugene ’s suicide attempt ultimately left him paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair. He is a prisoner in a prison of his own making, by his own choice. Eugene later succeeds in his second attempt to commit suicide, ending a life in which he feels has only been "second best."
Eugene gives us a prime example of the difference between knowing one’s destiny and believing one’s destiny. Eugene is an unmotivated individual, and while he knows that his job prospects, peer respect and admiration are virtually predetermined, he lacks the will to seek these things. He is, for lack of a better term, listless and unmotivated. He knows his life is already mapped out for him. Eugene is exactly as the philosopher William James would have predicted him to be in his paper, "The Dilemma of Determinism." James hypothesizes that if all events were predetermined, then all of the human experience would be essentially meaningless. What good is remorse or regret if all actions are predetermined anyway? Since it is already fated that he should be a massive success in life, what is the point in living and striving for it? Eugene fails to see that, and knowing his life is predetermined, Eugene becomes consigned to his "listless" state.
But what if Eugene merely believed that his life was predetermined, rather than knowing it? That would come close to Max Weber’s theory of the Protestant work ethic. This ethic has had a profound impact on Western society. Calvinists believed that all was predetermined and salvation awaited them as part of God's divine plan. And while all action was essentially preplanned, the Protestant work ethic lead these people to live a life of "reassuring signs" that they will be saved in the afterlife. Diligence, hard work, and a clean and moral life were good signs that heaven awaited the believer in the afterlife. If Eugene merely believed his life were predetermined, that he was given this great gift to fulfill some higher purpose, then perhaps he would (have) become the man Vincent ultimately becomes through his alias.
However, filmmaker Niccol misses an interesting philosophical question: is Vincent driven to be a dreamer and achieve his goals through his own genes? Is Eugene merely listless because of some genetic flaw?
Niccol gives no thought in the film to the possibility that free will is merely a predetermined illusion. Is Vincent’s desire for self-determination—for the free will to fully control his life—only an illusion created by the delicate double helix flowing through his veins? Or is it merely learned from years of living in the shadow of his younger, genetically engineered brother? While Vincent’s behavior does seem to be primarily motivated by his interactions with his brother, the film gives no thought to the idea that somewhere in his DNA is a sequence dictating that he will be a man driven to become more than the sum of his parts.
Is Eugene’s listlessness to be blamed for his state? Again, Niccols seems to answer no. While virtually all the "valid" characters seem to be rather unmotivated, Eugene is an extreme case of the phenomenon, to say the least. This would seem to indicate that the valids' lack of motivation is largely (if not wholly) genetically determined. If that is so, why can’t Vincent’s desire to be more be genetically determined as well?
The question of what influence our DNA has on our behavior is largely unanswered. With the exception of the doctor listing Attention Deficit Disorder as a potential problem for the newborn Vincent, the film makes no real connection between behavior and genes, even though it is a well-documented fact that certain behavior diseases, such as alcoholism, are somewhat genetically predetermined; a portion of the population is predisposed to become alcoholics, should they ever choose to indulge in intoxication. While genetics doesn’t outright determine these behaviors, it certainly leaves individuals prone to it.
Additionally, Gattacaoffers no real link between genetics and intelligence, another hole in the film's argument for free will. Vincent does not simply take "smart pills" to overcome his genes, he appears to be a fairly intelligent (and determined) individual from the very beginning. He does memorize an entire book on astrophysics and appears to have learned the necessary skills to navigate a spacecraft to Titan with no help from others. If the only thing preventing him from reaching his dream of space flight is physical, then there is no real difference between the astronauts of the not so distant future and the astronauts of today.
So while Gattacastands as a testament to free will and its existence, the film must make several concessions to determinism. By not addressing several key philosophical questions, the film's argument (and the film itself), for all of its sophistication otherwise, weakens itself.
Sample 4: Doctorow’s Homer �" Blindness, Insight, and the Senses of the Body
E.L. Doctorow’s novel, Homer and Langley, is narrated by a character named Homer, who is blind. Because he lacks his sense of sight, Homer is forced to describe the world around him through his other senses and engages the reader in a way many narrators cannot. Homer relates to the reader because neither can truly see the story at hand and must use their mind to view the events being told. By using this form of writing, the author attempts to explain the importance of our other senses. He encourages the reader to understand that vision can often cloud the judgment, and he calls his readers to observe their own lives by using more than just their eyes to see the world around them.
Near the beginning of the novel, Homer relates an experience from his youth when he and his girlfriend, Eleanor, stumble upon a pornographic movie. This is the first experience with film that the narrator relates. Before the viewing, he and the girl had a relationship, which Homer describes as “So serious that even Langley, who lived in another cabin with his age group, did not tease me" (9). He also asks, “Is there any love purer than this, when you don’t even know what it is?" (9). He is assuring the reader that this was a young and untainted love.
When the two see the pornographic movie, Homer explains that he was so enraptured by the scene that he did not even notice Eleanor leave. This shows the intense hold that a visual image can have over a person. The scene itself was depicted in such a way that Homer says, “Romance was unseated in my mind and in its place was enthroned the idea that sex was something you did to them" (11). This means that his entire view of sexual relationships between men and women was changed into something bad or unjust in a few seconds of viewing a film. From that moment on, Eleanor would have nothing to do with him, suggesting that she had had a similar reaction to the film that Homer had.
This is an example of the power that our eyes can hold over our minds and our views of life. Homer himself refers to this idea of romance as a “puerile illusion" (11), which, for some reason, still holds strong for adults, even in circumstances when it is clearly disproven. He seems to be attributing this universal illusion to circumstances similar to his own, and that it is taught through things such as pornography, confusing the eyes to believe something which people are naturally unaware of as youths and making it impossible for them to discredit it because, after all, they have seen it with their own eyes.
Later in his life, Homer begins to go blind. Even in his blind state, Homer seems to make his way around just fine, making use of all his other senses. He finds that he can feel the presence of objects and maneuver around them. He can feel light and darkness on his skin and also hear it in the tone of his piano keys. In many ways, Homer is much more capable, even though he is blind, than the others around him.
At one point during the novel, a group of hippie teenagers come to stay with Homer and Langley. One night, the power goes out, and several people are stranded in the house in complete darkness. Homer, however, has an awareness that the others, who use their vision daily, do not. They must rely on light to see, and once they are without it, they do not know how to call upon their other senses. As the narrator shares, “It was the blind brother who got everyone organized, telling them not to move, but to stay where they were until I came and got them" (157-58). At this point, the house is a maze of garbage and danger to those who cannot see, but Homer’s disability proves to be almost a super power that enables him to lead his friends to safety. The author is trying to show that there is an even greater form of sight for those who actively engage the senses other than vision.
One of the most important senses which the author chooses to focus on is the sense of hearing. Throughout the novel, Doctorow often uses the theme of music to emphasize the importance of listening rather than seeing. Homer himself is a classically trained, professional pianist, a detail that the author includes to pinpoint Homer as the observant, almost all seeing character of the story. He also becomes very knowledgeable in popular music later when he and Langley decide to hold tea dances. It is at these tea dances that Homer listens to the shuffle of the dancers’ feet and to the scrape of chairs, which indicates that people are sitting down when he puts on livelier songs.
Homer’s ability to hear such details allows him to understand the motives and desires of the people surrounding him, even when they are not trying to communicate. Just by these details, he can determine that “The people who come to our tea dances have no fight left in them. They are not interested in having a good time. They come here to . . . hold one another and drift around the room" (64). It is by these observations that Homer is able to view the world as it passes through time and document them with an understanding that escapes Langley, who can actually see the dancers. Doctorow is showing that these details are not so easily picked up on by those who do not know how to absorb sensory information when it is subtle and not, so to speak, right before their eyes.
Much later, after the tea dances are put to an end Langley shows up at the house with a television set. The brothers’ experience with the TV gives a lot of insight to the author’s motives. Homer explains something that Langley said to him concerning the television: “When you read or listen to the radio, he said, you see the scene in your mind. It’s like you with life, Homer. Infinite perspectives, endless horizons. But the TV screen flattens everything, it compresses the world, to say nothing of one’s mind" (108).
The author is giving a warning to his readers. He is making a statement directly about TV that it is a form of manipulation in that it can influence a person’s view of the events it is projecting. TV can change the world into one possibility, one idea that someone wants circulated, and spoon feed it to its viewers, robbing their minds of the right to interpret and decipher truth. He is also advising his readers against trusting everything they see in general because if we do not incorporate information from all of our senses, we are not getting the full story. Soon after procuring their TVs, the brothers decide to turn theirs off forever, at least until the moon landing several years later. They do not wish to be conformed to one standard of thought by their television set.
One last comparison the reader might make within the novel is that while Homer is blind, Langley is also handicapped in his own way. After his experience in the war, he comes home having been attacked by poisonous gas, which he had inhaled and left sores around his mouth. Homer describes, “His voice was a kind of gargle and he kept coughing and clearing his throat. He had been a clear tenor when he left, and would sing the old arias as I played them. Not now" (21). It might be implied that the gas has affected Langley’s mouth and possibly his nose, likely damaging his sense of taste and of smell. This would limit him to three rather than five senses with which to gather and interpret input from the world around him.
Correspondingly, Langley seems to go crazy throughout the course of the book. His view of life is very skewed in comparison to most people, and it causes him to live in a physically and mentally unhealthy way. In this way, Langley is almost the opposite of Homer. Homer’s mention of Langley no longer singing relates the theme of music, showing that Langley is disconnected from it and is out of tune with his sense of hearing as well. This renders him incapable of picking up on the same subtle details that Homer can. Langley has very few resources to rely on other than his eyes, so they are very important to his gathering of information. Langley’s character and the course he leads the novel down could be Doctorow’s way of showing the frightening possibilities that might occur if a person abandons their senses and relies solely on one, namely the sense of sight.
In the novel, Homer is the most clear minded and all seeing character. He is the one who witnesses all of the events in his and Langley’s life with explicit detail and recounts them with an untainted perspective. It is vital that he is both the blind brother and the narrator because his blindness is what allows him to see the world so honestly. Doctorow is showing his readers that it is the use of all the senses that will allow them to view and properly understand their surroundings. When one is limited to understanding only what he or she can see, he or she is unable to view from multiple perspectives and to incorporate all the information that is being presented by their surroundings. On the contrary, by using all the senses, one is given every opportunity and ability to discover truth and utilize it to enhance one’s own life. This is an opportunity that Langley does not make use of, perhaps because of the damage he has experienced to his senses, which disables him. His choices also deprive Homer of the quality of life he might have enjoyed under different circumstances.