By The Waters of Babylon
“By the Waters of Babylon” Analytical Essay
"It is better to lose one's life than one's spirit." John went out of his way to visit the Place of the Gods, despite the forest people, who could have killed him. Knowledge and truth, to him, was more important than his own life. “By the Waters of Babylon” has a major theme of ‘our society eats knowledge entirely too fast.” In “By the Waters of Babylon” you will meet John, a character who learns through a difficult journey that knowledge can be very costly.
If a person killed a deer and ate too much of it, he would feel sick and/or sluggish. Anyone who has overeaten knows that bloated feeling, especially after Thanksgiving dinner! Truth is a good thing, just like deer meat is a good thing for a hungry person. But truth, too, has its negative side effects. When a person is exposed to too much truth, especially considering the age of the person, truth can hurt. Consider the breakup of a long relationship. When the truth is told, "I just don't love you any more", the one hearing the truth is hurt. When a child finds out why they were put up for adoption, they may feel rejection of a horrible kind. Adopted children may fantasize about a parent being too poor to care properly for them, and giving them up to a loving, caring couple. To hear, "I didn't want you" would make you as sick as if you have eaten the whole Thanksgiving turkey by yourself. Trying to continue living a normal life after that would take a lot of effort after that kind of rejection.
John is the narrator in “By the Waters of Babylon”; he is also the main character. Any reader would recognize that the story is written in first person because the narrator uses personal pronouns such as “I, my, and we”. He describes many events, altercations, and situations in the story using his point of view. “Never trust the innocent” words from Jarrod Hester. John seems as if he is just an innocent little boy, but is he really innocent? A naive character always makes us
"It is better to lose one's life than one's spirit." John went out of his way to visit the Place of the Gods, despite the forest people, who could have killed him. Knowledge and truth, to him, was more important than his own life. “By the Waters of Babylon” has a major theme of ‘our society eats knowledge entirely too fast.” In “By the Waters of Babylon” you will meet John, a character who learns through a difficult journey that knowledge can be very costly.
If a person killed a deer and ate too much of it, he would feel sick and/or sluggish. Anyone who has overeaten knows that bloated feeling, especially after Thanksgiving dinner! Truth is a good thing, just like deer meat is a good thing for a hungry person. But truth, too, has its negative side effects. When a person is exposed to too much truth, especially considering the age of the person, truth can hurt. Consider the breakup of a long relationship. When the truth is told, "I just don't love you any more", the one hearing the truth is hurt. When a child finds out why they were put up for adoption, they may feel rejection of a horrible kind. Adopted children may fantasize about a parent being too poor to care properly for them, and giving them up to a loving, caring couple. To hear, "I didn't want you" would make you as sick as if you have eaten the whole Thanksgiving turkey by yourself. Trying to continue living a normal life after that would take a lot of effort after that kind of rejection.
John is the narrator in “By the Waters of Babylon”; he is also the main character. Any reader would recognize that the story is written in first person because the narrator uses personal pronouns such as “I, my, and we”. He describes many events, altercations, and situations in the story using his point of view. “Never trust the innocent” words from Jarrod Hester. John seems as if he is just an innocent little boy, but is he really innocent? A naive character always makes us