The death of moth & The battle of ants At first, I read the death of moth. I thought this articles are kind of elusive especially the death of moth. However, after reading several times and gathering more information about the writer, I have some own opinion about it.
Comparing the death of moth, the battle of ants is more powerful, and depicts more detail about the process of battle. No one writes about such a negligible things and describe it in such details. Through reading the process of ant’s struggling and the movement of tussling, I not only feel the power of two group of ants, but also I even can experience writer’s mood.
However, the death of the moth is kind of negative to me cause it express the death always defeat us. The Virginia Woolf, the writer of the death of moth, used the same insignificant objet in her article. Use a lot word like “ not properly” “ little” “nothing” to create a negligible object. Though she described all the big beautiful background for the nature, this comparing between significant surrounding and a little moth brings me more stronger feeling that no one care about the moth.
Both articles illustrate the struggling between life and death. Virginia Woolf’s opinion is focus on the futility of struggling. Henry David Thoreau emphasized the contending between two groups. Reviewing the death of moth, I noticed that there are many metaphors in the article. Like so stiff or so awkward", or "The horses stood still” are all the signs of the death. Also, the writer used rhetoric skills that change from the begging to the last. At first, the writer uses the vivid and description to illustrate. Then, at the last of article, the writer uses more elusive way to complete the essay. Her opinion in writing is to remind audience the power that death has over life. She described the death from many different angles with a logic way but also full of emotion and feeling. About the battle of ants, writer’s main idea is “conquer to die” and he used stronger rhetoric. It is about a battle between two different species of ants, red and black. However, through analyzing the whole article, the writer used the battle of ants as sarcasm of people’s conflict. The writer use powerful words to present his opinion that battle is meaningless and futile. He also used some metaphor to combine the battle of ants to the war of human like “the ferocity and carnage of a human battle before my door.” Furthermore, he described all the details about the battle like every injuries and process of struggling. All of them brings us a vivid picture of cruel war.