William Mann Amanda Holida C period 06 April 2023 Bombarding forces impact our daily lives everyday and it is often our choice as to how we will handle these obstacles. Last week my literature group and I finished the novel Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds. This is a story that takes place all in a minute time period in an elevator ride where the main character Will is facing the forces of his past. He experiences certain family members as well as friends enter the elevator as ghosts where they give him advice on his big decision. Will has to decide by the end of the novel will he get revenge for his brothers death or Will he go against the rules of the street and live his life. Reynolds uses literary techniques such as imagery, tone, and …show more content…
Reynolds used this literary technique to tell me what the decision process was like for Will in the elevator. When Will is almost half way down the elevator ride Dani, a ghost from the past, has begun lighting cigarettes with buck and the smoke starts to cloud up the box. Suddenly two hands jump at him and Will describes them as, “The largest I’d ever seen, / rushed through the cloud / hard and fast, / snatching fistfuls of my shirt, / yoking me by the neck”(Jason Reynolds 153). These hands turned out to be Will's father entering the elevator as a ghost. The description of the hands and their swift movements help me picture his father jumping at him in an intense fashion. Reynolds uses imagery to describe another person that enters the elevator but has a much different impact on Will than his dad did. For instance the door of the elevator opened, “A stranger, / chubby, / light skin, / almost white…”(Reynolds 237). In this part of the novel a man Frick walks in the elevator but this is a difficult situation for Will because he killed his brother's model Buck. Frick entering the elevator develops a new perspective for Will on how people have influenced him. Frick killed Buck and the way Reynolds uses imagery to depict him shows he is not a family …show more content…
A moment when the tone changes is near the beginning when Dani, Will’s childhood friend enters the elevator. Will rethinks what it was like when she died and says, “No crying, / feeling like / I wanted to scratch / my skin off scratch / my eyes out punch / through something/ …” (Reynolds 136). The sorrowful yet uneasy tone in this quote from Will emphasizes how sad death is, and for Will it influences his decision for whether to kill Riggs or not. Not only is it sorrowful it sounds painful as the scratching of skin and eyes are gruesome actions. Although Will holds back from crying after Dani’s death when Shawn enters the elevator a whole new set of emotions are running through his head. Will asks him if he should kill riggs or not and when Shawn doesn’t answer him he, “Breaks down / The tears were coming / and he did what he could / to hold them back” (Reynolds 297). The number one rule on Will’s street is no crying taught to him by his brother. When Shawn enters the elevator he spreads an anxious and uncertain tone throughout the elevator and into Will. The anxious tone is created when Shawn won’t respond to Will’s questions. This tone resets Will, into having a lost mindset of what he will do once he steps out of the
“She spoke a sudden thought. ‘You know, Will, I thought you were wonderful, when I was a little thing (p. 346).”’ She shared this as if expressing that her feelings weren’t the same anymore. It was a sad reflection they shared that their once love for each other had
Since he's seen someone almost die because of the carousel, the thought of someone he loves being harmed by it really upset him. The last instance in which Will displayed a fearful tone was when Mr. Dark tried to cover up Mr. Cooger’s obvious trips around the carousel, “…Will trembled…”(110) Will is showing a fearful tone by “…trembling…” since that is an action one performs when they are overtaken by fright. Will has a fearful tone in the situation because he was responsible for the extreme aging of Mr. Cooger and he understands that the freaks are going to have a vendetta against him since he caused harm to one of
As Will heads back to Toronto after his mother's funeral, Harlen meets him at the airport to pursued him to start a photography business in Medicine River. Clouded with emotions after his mother's funeral, Will "[silps] from melancholy to depression" (75), and refuses Harlen's business proposal. He has no plans in returning to Medicine River and he throws away the folder from Harlen. However, Will was unable to find a job in Toronto, so he decides to take the opportunity to start a new life in Medicine River. By starting a business in Medicine River, he is obligated to stay and live in the town to make a living.
The reason it expresses emotionalism is because he is trying to get the listeners, who are sinners, to think that God will drop them into hell at any given moment. The quotation for this
Will Shawn’s experiences and guidance help Will, or will it lead him astray? The first reason why Shawn has the biggest impact on Will is because he’s an older brother/father figure to Will. For example, a quote in the book states “ Shawn was my big brother, my best friend, my protector. He was the only one who always looked out for me, no matter what” (Reynolds, 21).
Throughout the entire novel, the author’s use of literary devices is very clear. These literary devices, specifically similes and personification, help the reader get a better idea of the exact sounds and feelings which will allow them to know what it feels like to be there in that moment. “ I stood there, trying to think of a comeback, when suddenly, I heard a whooshing sound, like the sound you get when you open a vacuum-sealed can of peanuts. Then the brown water that had puddled up all over the field began to move. It began to run toward the back portables, like someone pulled the plug out of a giant bathtub.
His performance also becomes more dramatic due to the setting being in what looks to be a mausoleum. In addition to the setting and his body language making the performance more dramatic, the dim lit setting and the way the camera flips from Gibson distraught and indecisive looking face to the skeletons and tombs around him makes it more emotional. The look on Gibson's face makes the performance exceedingly more emotioal due to the way he seems to be giving what he is saying a lot of thought and as the camera focuses in on his face his eyes give off a distraught and depressing look, which leads to why the performances s a also depressing. The scene is depressing because not only is Gibson projecting a depressing mood but the way he delivers the lines so slow,dreadful and lifeless makes the audience feel sorry for him.
Will at the start of the story wanted to find a sense of belonging but doubted that he could find it. For example, when Charles asked him to join the basketball team he denied him at first saying “I 'm not good enough to play” Harleen
This is a quote about Will seeing Shawn cry for the first time. “And even though/ his face was wet/ with tears he wasn’t/ supposed to cry/ when he was alive./ I couldn’t see him/ as anything less/ than my brother,/ my favorite,/ my only” (299). This quote shows that Will sees his brother breaking The Rules and is okay with it.
Jason Reynolds uses symbolism, figurative language, and repetition to show how all the characters are connected through their hardships and emotions. Jason Reynolds uses many symbols to portray an important message in the book. In particular, the chapter “The Low Cuts Strike Again,” says “The Low Cuts, steal anything that jingles… ‘Four vanilla soft serves,’ Bit ordered… Bit’s mom had relapsed, ‘We got you a bunch of ice cream' Bit says”(20, 39, 40).
Through vivid imagery, the audience gets to experience the emotions that Staples and the pedestrians had. Staples pulls the readers from being mere spectators of the experiences he has had directly into the shoes of the pedestrians and Staples himself. Thus, the audience becomes more prone to sympathize with Staples’ situation. Furthermore, readers gain a deeper understanding of how real and common the problem that Staples addresses in his essay is. The emotions portrayed by the strong imagery not only garners sympathy, it may help readers relate better to Staples’ essay.
One big way to improve Will’s communication is to deal with the relationship violence that occurred to him. Sean started this for him in the scene where he tried to get Will to see that his upbringing was not his fault. This was a big step for Will to understand himself and how he should see his relationships. Through Sean, Will also learned some emotional understanding of himself. Emotional understanding will allow him to have emotional competence.
This trip changed White’s outlook on life, for he finally realized that mortality was closer than he imagined. He was no longer young, and watching his son mature only made this notion more real. One day, he will be only a memory to his son, just like his father is to him. White uses a variety of rhetorical devices to convey the message to his audience that life moves quickly, not stopping for anything, including emotionally-charged diction, imagery, and personification. White uses emotionally-charged diction as a form of pathos to convey his feelings about his past and explain trouble he is having with accepting his old age.
This paragraph employs robotic imagery most heavily and also uses loaded diction more than others. This section even goes so far as to call Worth’s body in intensive care as, “a nightmare of tubes and wires, dark machines silently measuring every internal event, a pump filling and emptying his useless lungs.” This section channels the intensity of an event like this and the fear one and one’s loved ones feel when the shade of fatality affects a person. Imagery also plays a large part in this section and places the reader in the situation John Jeremiah Sullivan was in through imagery like “The stench of dried spit”. This passage’s imagery challenges the reader to undergo the stale smell described and to witness the machine that Worth is connected to.
During the film Will demonstrates anger as well as irritability in a short tempered manner. In a particular scene, Will becomes overwhelmed with anger after encountering an old classmate who bullied him in preschool. Such anger and irritability caused Will’s mind to become blocked during the violent act in which Will also assaults an office. The incident ultimately leads Will unraveling the root of the