Daily Archives: February 9, 2024

I relate to the narrator in “Salvation” by Langston Hughes, due to the reason that as a child my family was extremely religious and they wanted me to follow in the same footsteps. They fed me so many ideas of how good is our savior our hope and the important part that he would help us in times of need you just have to pray. As I grew older I started to question religion but my family went through a rough patch and we needed help so I prayed asking for help from god but nothing happened noting worked and I was left disappointed and all my faith was gone. For example the character in Salvation Westley where he did the following “Finally Westley said to me in a whisper: “God damn! I’m tired o’ sitting here. Let’s get up and be saved” (Hughes). Westley actions shows that he too questioned the entire ceremony but due to the pressure of everyone in the church he gave in and just got up to get it over with.

“Salvation” by Langston Hughes is a coming of age story about a boy having an experience in church that changed his whole perspective on faith. Young Langston and his family go to church and his aunt tells him he would be saved when he saw the light and Jesus comes into your life. After Langston sits in church waiting for this miracle to happen he realizes it won’t “And I kept waiting serenely for Jesus, waiting, waiting – but he didn’t come. I wanted to see him, but nothing happened to me. Nothing! I wanted something to happen to me, but nothing happened” (Hughes). I personally relate to this because growing up my parents were not heavily religious but we still were involved in some practices. We were Catholic so we went to church on Easter, Communion, and we were baptized. As I got older and I started learning about history and how Christianity was used against Black people it caused a lot of questions about religion, how I view it and where I stand in having a relationship with God. I am still discovering that relationship and defining it everyday.

I personally relate to the young narrator in salvation in the sense that he was willing to lie in order for people to have a great time. In my life i’ve been put in situations where I had to lie in order for people to enjoy themselves and not to worry about other things that may be going on. Although the young narrator is a people pleaser, I don’t necessarily think thats a bad thing at all it just shows that he cares and has a heart. It’s very hard to find someone who actually cares about others in a way that they would put aside what they believe in order to help others. The young narrator could have easily disregarded everything going on in the church and not stand up, but he didn’t because of the fact that he cares about how his actions may affect others not just his.

One way I personally relate to the young narrator in “Salvation” is with his love for honesty and truth. That is a personality trait I can say I’ve carried on with me since childhood into my adulthood. If we look at the last paragraph of the story “Salvation”, we see the narrator crying and feels totally distraught because he lied to his aunt and “deceived everybody in the church” that he had seen Jesus. I feel I can relate to how he must have felt. There has been times when I’ve told lies that felt so wrong, I just couldn’t bear caring on the lie, I wanted to tell the truth. All the day long I’d just be thinking about the lie I told and think about how much better I’d feel, how much a load would feel lifted off my chest if I just admitted the truth. Also I can see how much he values when other people speak the truth to him. For instance his aunt had told him “that when you were saved you saw a light, and something happened to you inside! And Jesus came into your life! And God was with you from then on!” He felt it was all a lie because at the night of the big revival when the children were going to the altar “and were saved” he knew the kid Westley had lied; he knew he didn’t see Jesus but lied just to get over with the ceremony. The narrator wondered why God didn’t struck Westley right there and then for lying. In that moment the narrator felt like everything he had been told about Jesus by his aunt and all the old people had told were lies and that dwindled his faith in Jesus. I’ve had similar experiences where […]

In the narration of “Salvation” by Langston Hughes, I personally relate to the young narrator because, I decided as a young adult that I wanted to convert to Christianity (Born again Christian) in a Pentecostal church. This church was very lively. It had a live band, the words to the songs were on a large screen so that everyone could sing along. Everyone would raise their hands and shout to the Lord, Praise you, Lord! I had never experienced this kind 0f church. It was very different. At the end of the sermon, the Pastor would say, won’t you come? won’t you come to Jesus?  This is where I really relate to that 12-year-old boy, because I felt the same way he did. Everyone was going up to the alter and I just sat there. Not knowing how I was feeling about coming to Jesus in this way. I think new things and different things make us have questions and make us scared, even as young adults..

Hello professor. I have always considered myself to be a hopeless romantic. I can see my self personally relating to the young narrator in “Araby” as opposed to the young narrator in Salvation. My reasoning for this is because of two reasons. One is because my mother always made it very clear to me that god is not someone you can psychically see or touch . She explained to me that it has to do with faith and that the presence of god comes from within the soul. The boy in this text however took his aunts words literally, therefore breaking his trust and faith. I can not relate to this simply because I have never gone through this experience. I can relate more to the      “Araby” story because although I didn’t stalk anyone like he did or have never went to the lengths he did to pursue the thought of being with this woman, but I understand the feeling of wanting/craving someone the way he craved for her. That feeling can be bliss , if the crave is reciprocated. But If it is not . . . your story will most likely end up like his.

I personally relate to the young narrator in “Araby” because some people at some point would feel the same way the narrator was feeling when he had a crush on this girl and wanted her to notice him. The girl ended up approaching him and started talking about him going to a bazaar . This young narrator was capable of doing anything for this girl that he realized that at the end of the day it was all just child’s play. I can relate to this because it proves that if you truly love someone you’re capable of doing anything for that person. The young narrator still chose to go to the bazaar even though it was already late, he was impatiently waiting for his uncle and still went even though his uncle forgot. Love will make you do things you thought you were incapable of doing. This young narrator didn’t hesitate and took off to the bazaar.

In the narration of “Salvation” by Langston Hughes, I related to him since I remember my childhood when I didn’t truly believe in religion, but my family did. There was a time when at least one day a week, it was church morning with my aunts and cousins. I liked going only because there were snacks for the children, and they separated us into like grades to teach us religious things the cool thing about is that i was able to play with those kids. But my favorite part was the juice with the sandwich.

I think I personally relate to the narrator in “Salvation”. I relate to him on the fact of realizing reality and the effects that, that can have on you as a child. Langston Hughes was very naive, as so was I and many children his age in his story was. He was naive because he took the adults in the story word for what will happen to him when he is saved. He expected like a magical feeling and see “God” which as adults, we know this not to be true, but telling this to a child he took it very literal. This reminded me of a time when I was younger and my cousin told me my mother was not coming back home after work because, she ran away. Now as a child I did not know that they were joking but just like the narrator, I was naive and took them very literal. I was very sad and confused. So I was able to relate to him on this through this.

I can personally relate to the narrator in Araby as I too, was once desperately in love with someone who much likely saw nothing else but a 10 year-old young girl. He was a maybe 16 or 17 year old boy working at the nearby supermarket that I regularly visited. I remember the feeling of excitement when my mom would tell me to go buy an item missing from her pantry for dinner. The questions running through my head: would he be working? Should I change what I was wearing? What could I do to catch his attention, without being too obvious? My visit at the store, although mundane, was sort of meticulously planned – just like the narrator in Araby who purposely left his home as he saw Mangan’s sister leave hers. The calculated speeding to pass her – a seemingly innocent act that ensured that he was noticed – seems to have been taken out of my playbook. Despite the thrill, the planning and the anxiety, the reality was that I would go to the store, get what was needed, pay at the register and leave. A rather underwhelming conclusion. A disappointment. While in the story, the narrator’s dismay is initially caused by his uncle’s tardiness, which in turn led him to be late to the bazaar and unable to fulfill his objective, he and I both end up with the same result: not in any way closer to the object of our affection.

Some ways that I relate to the young narrator in “Salvation” is because I also journal my experiences as they happen, and when I write, the language I use is informal and the tone is direct. In “Salvation,” the narrator is conversational and informal, and I feel that it enhances the authenticity of the narrative and allows readers to empathize. An example of this is when the young narrator starts off the story with “I was saved from sin when I was going on thirteen. But not really saved. It happened like this.” (Hughes). This portrays the writer’s innocence and the sincerity of a child while maintaining straightforward sentence structures to show us that informal and direct tone. Another way I relate to the young narrator is that he is a people pleaser. The definition of a people pleaser is the want/need to please others even at their own expense. This can be seen twice when the narrator is at church and says “I began to be ashamed of myself, holding everything up so long… I decided that maybe to save further trouble, I’d better lie.” (Hughes). Another example of this can be viewed toward the end of the story when Jesus did not come to the narrator, and he states “But I was really crying because I couldn’t bear to tell her that I had lied, that I had deceived everybody in the church.” (Hughes). I feel like these two quotes give some insight into a people pleaser’s mind  and how complex it is because he went from pleasing everybody by pretending to be saved to crying about lying to everybody that he got saved and let his aunt push the narrative that he was crying because he saw Jesus, which was ironic. While reading this story, it really […]

I believe that “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez was strategically chosen as the first reading for our course for several reasons. Firstly, Marquez incorporates various themes, notably beauty and identity, throughout the narrative. By diving into these themes during class discussions, both my classmates and I have the opportunity to develop critical thinking skills and gain deeper insights into the complexities of the human mind. Moreover, the story has captivating imagery that immerses readers in its world, allowing us to visualize the coastal village and presence of the drowned man. This vivid imagery not only enhances our reading experience but also serves as a door opening for deeper analysis and interpretation. Additionally, Marquez’s narrative style demands active engagement from readers. The portrayal of the narrator and the layers of meaning scattered within the text forces us to approach the story with an open mind. By initiating our course with “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World,” our professor has set a tone of curiosity and exploration. This text encourages us to delve into the depths of literature with open minds and keen insights, which I feel like transforms us in the world of literature.

I believe that the reason that professor Conway chose “the most handsomest drowned man in the world” was because the main themes of this story had to do with compassion and imagination. This is because throughout the story we see the way all the characters wonder so much about this man. They are curious about a complete stranger who they have no genuine idea where in the hell he came from. And they all make up and imagine what this mans life and experiences must have been like. They imagine what it would have been like being so tall, so large, and so much different compared to all of the villagers/neighboring villagers that they are so used to seeing. And even though they do not know who he is, they care for his corpse and try their best to give his corpse as close to a proper burial as possible.

I  can relate to the young narrator’s journey through the intense pressure to conform to societal or familial expectations, the confusion of navigating one’s own beliefs amidst those pressures, and the profound sense of loss that comes with the realization that faith cannot be forced. The story captures a pivotal moment of innocence lost and the painful but necessary transition into personal understanding and skepticism. It’s a poignant reflection on the complexities of growing up, challenging authoritative narratives, and the quest for personal truth. This narrative can resonate with anyone who has faced the difficult passage from childhood innocence to the more nuanced understanding of adulthood, where beliefs and truths are often more complicated than they seem. Salvation serves as a poignant exploration of faith, the journey towards self-awareness, and the realization that personal beliefs and truths are complex and often diverge from those around us. It’s these universal themes of growth, disillusionment