An AP prompt essay discussing how writers must prepare to be unsatisfied and must not be concerned about flattery because success in writing comes only with maturity.

Essay by ImsojewishHigh School, 11th gradeA, December 2004

download word file, 3 pages 0.0

Downloaded 22 times

Everyday more and more people try to make a profession in being a successful writer. In this passage, aspiring writer Melusina Fay Peirce writes to novelist Marian Evans Lewes asking if beginning writing at thirty is too old. Evans is moved by this letter and responds mentioning thirty is not too old. In the letter, she comments that even an accomplished writer such as herself is rarely satisfied with hours of work. It is impossible to be an accomplished writer without having years of wisdom behind you. Throughout the passage, she utilizes various persuasive techniques such as refutation and analogies in order to depict novice work as tasteless. In Lewes response to Peirce, she incorporates many rhetorical strategies in order to convey that writers must prepare to be unsatisfied and must not be concerned about flattery because success in writing comes only with maturity.

In the beginning of the letter, Evans uses a plethora of rhetorical strategies which suggest that in order to be a writer one must be ready to be unsatisfied.

Evans declares her "consciousness is not of the triumphant kind". Beginning her letter with a refutation immediately conveys that being a writer is a difficult life. Although one may put hours of hard work into a novel, satisfaction is not always achieved. She then states that "Exultation is a dream before achievement and rarely comes after". Evans suggests that she often fancies admiration before her work is finished only to encounter a deficiency of praise after. While Lewes may be a praised writer, she shocks Peirce when saying she is rarely commended for her work; writers' dreams are seldom met. When encountering the lack of the praise writers such as Evans tend to feel like a "poor husk". Evans uses this word...