What is an academic experience, project, class or book that has influenced or inspired you?
Here is my essay about Souvenirs Entomologiques. Please give me some suggestion on both the content and the language.Thank you very much.
Insects used to be the most horrifying thing in the world to me. It had never occurred to me to become a member of the insects study club in my school. However, I am not only a member but also the vice president of the club today. The person who brought me such a big change was Jean Henri Fabre.
Fabre recorded his experiences and achievements of insects research with his beautiful language, making the world of insects a literature form through which human could gain knowledge, fun and beauty. No any other scientist was talented with such expressive language. Nor was any other writer provided with such profound entomology accomplishments.
The divine observation ability of Fabre was impressive, which could be easily showed by his detailed delineation in Souvenirs Entomologiques. From the scene in which cicadas begged ants for food to the gesture by which mantises hung from the branch, Fabra's delineation of insects was in an amazingly subtle way. I could even feel the magnifying glass, the wet air and the smell of bugs around me. I found that the insects which I had been afraid of were actually so beautiful and diligent, and they are strikingly like human beings in many ways, such as the birth and death, the labor and the rape. These tiny creatures didn't only shock me with their mighty vitality, but also inspired me to view us human beings from a different angle.
After reading, I began to pay attention to those tiny but beautiful creatures instead of screaming at them. I stared at the colorful wings of butterflies and watched the ants move to their new home. I made several presentations about fireflies, cicadas and sparrows in the biology class and they were all highly praised by the students and the teacher. The more I found out, the more I was fascinated with the world of nature.
Besides, Souvenirs Entomologiques taught me something more important. Fabre had gone through a lot of prejudice and doubt throughout his life. The authorities of science sniffed at his self-study education, which made it impossible for him to establish his own laboratory. Fabre had to support the family of seven with his slender income, and he also needed money for his research. Despite so many difficulties, Fabre had never given up his desire for observation and research. His spirit of striving for the truth and exploring of nature were another theme of the book that I found, which was as colorful as or even more beautiful that the boundless universe of insects.
Fabre and his book have drawn me to explore nature, brought me to look into myself to find out my true spirit and taught me to think like a scientist in a deep and comprehensive way.
