Essay #2

The world’s average life expectancy is almost 70 years old. In a year, there are 365 days. In a day, there are 24 hours. In a day, there are 60 minutes. When the human brain is awake up, it’s constantly operating. When operating, it is also developing thousands and thousands of ideas through the series of events one goes through. Unfortunately, due to the great amount of ideas, we don’t know what is actually attainable. The line, “What goes on inside is just too fast and huge and all interconnected for words to do more than barely sketch the outlines of at most one tiny little part of it at any given instant,” in David Foster Wallace’s “Good Old Neon,” not only thoroughly portrays the feature of human nature, but also delivers connections with Michael Montaigne in his essays. Although describing “life” is arguably impossible, Michael Montaigne takes a shot at describing almost every bit he has about life. Through his description, he also presents the reality of life, which leads to Jane Austen’s style of writing in, “Pride and Prejudice.”

In the Essays of Michael Montaigne, Montaigne was able to clarify directly to the audience how his brain was functioning. He is known for his concept of knowledge. A key reason that makes these unique pieces of work is that, no matter how old these writings may be, it can still be related today. The audience was able to visualize how Montaigne went from topic to topic based off his ideas or even his personal experience. What Montaigne did that he was able to make connections with the audience was the realistic practices, such as deaths, emotional struggles, relationships, judgments, etc. In addition, he uses multiples of quotes of ancient writers to support his stand. Overall, Montaigne’s tendency to shift from a topic to topic corresponds with David Foster Wallace’s “barely sketch the outlines.”

Jane Austen and Michael Montaigne shares both similar and different writing. Due to the fact that Austen’s novel “Pride and Prejudice,” was fiction, she expressed her views and thoughts through the actions of the characters. In those characters, it included realistic themes, such as wealth, love, marriage, pride, and prejudice. Her use of historical fiction makes the story more realistic because it provides background information.

Because of the use of different writing styles and techniques in Jane Austen and Michael Montaigne, similarities weren’t visual in bare eyes until examination. Both writers were able to show the realistic themes with topics like judgment and imperfection. What made these two authors stand out were their unique style to relate with the audience. Overall, what kept these two works alive till today was the connections in personal experiences.