Hi there, everyone! I'm really thankful for you guys to take the time to read my essay. Essentially, I wrote this essay indeed in the morning, while I was sipping coffee, and reading the paper around September; I just made a few revisions and tried my best to polish it. Here's the topic:
Topic B: "Choose an issue of importance to you-the issue could be personal, school related, local, political, or international in scope-and write an essay in which you explain the significance of that issue to yourself, your family, your community, or your generation."
My only problem is that the length of the essay should be no more than 1 page; my essay comes out to be a page and a fourth. I would greatly appreciate if you guys find any opportunities to make the overall essay to be more concise, or find any unnecessary details to be cut out. Again, thank you so much for this. :) Here's my essay:
Oh, Love for Literature, Where Have Thou Gone?
By: Paul Tran
Sipping on my cup of morning coffee while flipping through the daily issue of The Washington Post, a particular title grabbed the attention of my eyes away from all others: "SAT Reading Scores Hit a Four-Decade Low" (The Washington Post). Pouring my coffee down the sink as if it had suddenly become repulsive as my eyes were glued to the paper, I scrutinized the article's contents, believing the title had done nothing but cried wolf; to my dismay, there indeed existed a terrifying wolf. Based upon the scores of the graduating class of 2012, the average, SAT reading score plummeted to 496, a 34-point drop from 1972 (The Washington Post). A 34-point plummet; the lowest score in four decades. Bewildered by these numbers, my stomach clenched further as I lifelessly fell onto my chair, realizing that the my most pessimistic views of society were indeed true; the young generation and future of America as a whole, that I was a member of, was turning its back towards one of the country's most loving soul mates: Literature.
I am a bookworm. That's right, I said it to the world; I am indeed a bookworm and I'm proud to be one. Reading had always been a close, fond friend of mine throughout my life; during the years of childhood, I spent countless hours venturing into the wondrous lands of Where the Wild Things Are and savored the succulent flavors and aroma of Green Eggs and Ham. Maturing with time, I soon expanded my passion being taking up waltzing with Oliver Twist and Robert Frost. To pick up a novel was to open the doors to a new perspective, a new life beyond my own; when the last page is flipped and all I could see is the back spine of the novel, I always ended every book with the same response: a heavy sigh of nostalgia and remorse, staring at the book as I recollect all the story's memories while deeply wishing for the plot to trend onward, for more pages and chapters to magically flourish into the novel. What can I say; a boy can dream, can he not?
As I peered into the magnifying glass of Sherlock Holmes, wept for the good health of Huckleberry Finn, and foiled the devious plans of the Cardinal Richelieu with Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, I soon began to see that my passion for literature was more of a private pleasure. Whenever excitedly bringing up topics from the numerous adventures I had encountered with my peers, I was met with only a few nervous chuckles and upright indifference; my friends simply had no interest in reading as I did! Thinking this only as a phase, I continued to unlock the worlds of literature into my years of high school, now conversing with Victor Hugo and Dumas through their words within Les Misérables and The Count of Monte Cristo, hoping that my peers would do similarly the same. To my misfortunes, my wishes were nothing but ashes and dust. Amidst all this negativity however, I realized that it is through this indifference towards reading that I solely possessed one quality none of my fellow classman could boast in ownership: a marriage with the past. As my classmates struggled to tie the connections between the colonial years of America to the outbreak of the Civil War as well as the New Deal and such, I instead beamed in my courses, vividly painting myself a holistic painting of the relationship of the past and present. Furthermore, I was able to fill in ditches along the path of humanity through thematic lessons I had acquired through my collection of works from authors of the past, ranging from that of the Great Depression to the lives of the common man during the French Revolution. Through the tales of books both ancient and fresh, my perspective of society's --be it American or international-- feats had become holistic and complete, while that of my peers remained vague and astray. Regardless of these advantages, I did not respond to this discovery with happiness; instead, I looked upon with anguish. To see my classmates lack appreciation and understanding of Voltaire's powerful, satirical ridicules against the orthodox ways of Europe in Candide or ignorantly miss the relevance of Huxley's eerily predictions of the industrial future to today's life in Brave New World evoked emotions more closely associated with painful stabs of cold steel to my heart than blissfulness; before my very eyes, I was witnessing through my own, close acquaintances the slow, painful severance of my generation's education with the stories of the past, and with that, the overall deterioration of today's wisdom.
With these endless thoughts of my antiquity flooding my mind as I sat on my chair like a puppet, staring at the article's title for a seemingly endless duration of time, I finally snapped back into reality with the eventual release of a heavy sigh. If the current state of reading were to follow the trend as stated from the newspaper, not only would this generation's marriage with the past and its wisdom be severed, but the entire knowledge of today's society would be nothing but crippled. Homer and his epics like The Odyssey; Cervantes and his bash against the assumed unity of class and worth in Don Quixote; the impacts carried upon the leafs of these novels, the meaning etched out from its inked words. All this would be lost from the minds of this generation if reading were to becoming an action of the forgotten past. The torch of knowledge would be blown out. But alas, what change is there am I to do if all my actions consisted of nothing but sulking around? I've had my coffee and my breakfast of the news through the paper. It's time that I find that beloved The Cat in the Hat; there are children expecting a captivating story to be told today at the public library.
--Essay owned and written by Paul Le Tran (Tran Le Phu)
P.T.
Topic B: "Choose an issue of importance to you-the issue could be personal, school related, local, political, or international in scope-and write an essay in which you explain the significance of that issue to yourself, your family, your community, or your generation."
My only problem is that the length of the essay should be no more than 1 page; my essay comes out to be a page and a fourth. I would greatly appreciate if you guys find any opportunities to make the overall essay to be more concise, or find any unnecessary details to be cut out. Again, thank you so much for this. :) Here's my essay:
Oh, Love for Literature, Where Have Thou Gone?
By: Paul Tran
Sipping on my cup of morning coffee while flipping through the daily issue of The Washington Post, a particular title grabbed the attention of my eyes away from all others: "SAT Reading Scores Hit a Four-Decade Low" (The Washington Post). Pouring my coffee down the sink as if it had suddenly become repulsive as my eyes were glued to the paper, I scrutinized the article's contents, believing the title had done nothing but cried wolf; to my dismay, there indeed existed a terrifying wolf. Based upon the scores of the graduating class of 2012, the average, SAT reading score plummeted to 496, a 34-point drop from 1972 (The Washington Post). A 34-point plummet; the lowest score in four decades. Bewildered by these numbers, my stomach clenched further as I lifelessly fell onto my chair, realizing that the my most pessimistic views of society were indeed true; the young generation and future of America as a whole, that I was a member of, was turning its back towards one of the country's most loving soul mates: Literature.
I am a bookworm. That's right, I said it to the world; I am indeed a bookworm and I'm proud to be one. Reading had always been a close, fond friend of mine throughout my life; during the years of childhood, I spent countless hours venturing into the wondrous lands of Where the Wild Things Are and savored the succulent flavors and aroma of Green Eggs and Ham. Maturing with time, I soon expanded my passion being taking up waltzing with Oliver Twist and Robert Frost. To pick up a novel was to open the doors to a new perspective, a new life beyond my own; when the last page is flipped and all I could see is the back spine of the novel, I always ended every book with the same response: a heavy sigh of nostalgia and remorse, staring at the book as I recollect all the story's memories while deeply wishing for the plot to trend onward, for more pages and chapters to magically flourish into the novel. What can I say; a boy can dream, can he not?
As I peered into the magnifying glass of Sherlock Holmes, wept for the good health of Huckleberry Finn, and foiled the devious plans of the Cardinal Richelieu with Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, I soon began to see that my passion for literature was more of a private pleasure. Whenever excitedly bringing up topics from the numerous adventures I had encountered with my peers, I was met with only a few nervous chuckles and upright indifference; my friends simply had no interest in reading as I did! Thinking this only as a phase, I continued to unlock the worlds of literature into my years of high school, now conversing with Victor Hugo and Dumas through their words within Les Misérables and The Count of Monte Cristo, hoping that my peers would do similarly the same. To my misfortunes, my wishes were nothing but ashes and dust. Amidst all this negativity however, I realized that it is through this indifference towards reading that I solely possessed one quality none of my fellow classman could boast in ownership: a marriage with the past. As my classmates struggled to tie the connections between the colonial years of America to the outbreak of the Civil War as well as the New Deal and such, I instead beamed in my courses, vividly painting myself a holistic painting of the relationship of the past and present. Furthermore, I was able to fill in ditches along the path of humanity through thematic lessons I had acquired through my collection of works from authors of the past, ranging from that of the Great Depression to the lives of the common man during the French Revolution. Through the tales of books both ancient and fresh, my perspective of society's --be it American or international-- feats had become holistic and complete, while that of my peers remained vague and astray. Regardless of these advantages, I did not respond to this discovery with happiness; instead, I looked upon with anguish. To see my classmates lack appreciation and understanding of Voltaire's powerful, satirical ridicules against the orthodox ways of Europe in Candide or ignorantly miss the relevance of Huxley's eerily predictions of the industrial future to today's life in Brave New World evoked emotions more closely associated with painful stabs of cold steel to my heart than blissfulness; before my very eyes, I was witnessing through my own, close acquaintances the slow, painful severance of my generation's education with the stories of the past, and with that, the overall deterioration of today's wisdom.
With these endless thoughts of my antiquity flooding my mind as I sat on my chair like a puppet, staring at the article's title for a seemingly endless duration of time, I finally snapped back into reality with the eventual release of a heavy sigh. If the current state of reading were to follow the trend as stated from the newspaper, not only would this generation's marriage with the past and its wisdom be severed, but the entire knowledge of today's society would be nothing but crippled. Homer and his epics like The Odyssey; Cervantes and his bash against the assumed unity of class and worth in Don Quixote; the impacts carried upon the leafs of these novels, the meaning etched out from its inked words. All this would be lost from the minds of this generation if reading were to becoming an action of the forgotten past. The torch of knowledge would be blown out. But alas, what change is there am I to do if all my actions consisted of nothing but sulking around? I've had my coffee and my breakfast of the news through the paper. It's time that I find that beloved The Cat in the Hat; there are children expecting a captivating story to be told today at the public library.
--Essay owned and written by Paul Le Tran (Tran Le Phu)
P.T.