Analysis Of A Letter To America By Margaret Atwood
The America We Are Today Canadian author Margaret Atwood studied American literature at Radcliffe and Harvard in the 1960s. She decided to become a writer at an early age and is now the author of 13 novels, not to mention a few children’s stories and television scripts. In Atwood’s “A Letter to America”, she starts off by talking about the America she used to know. She lists numerous items that represent the American icon and the purpose for doing so was to get a glimpse of the America she knew as a child. “. . . you were the amazing trio, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Faulkner, who traced the dark labyrinths of your hidden heart.” (17). Many teenage-adults in this century don’t really recall most of the characters and/or books she mentioned,
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“Anyway, when did you get so scared? You didn’t used to be easily frightened.” (18). Her little provocation had recalled from the past how America would jump to defend their nation. She conjured up some anger within some Americans patriotic enough to fight for the country. Many people around the world are concerned with the decisions that the U.S. is making regarding to war and protecting their country. Atwood’s harsh critique of America continues when explaining the amount of debt America is in and the “torching” of the American economy. “Keep spending at this rate and pretty soon you won’t be able to afford any big military adventures.” (18). Her charged description of “big military adventures” implicates the equipment that soldiers will need for going to war. Either that or America would go the way of the USSR and possess lots of tanks, but no air conditioning. With the attention finally captivated, she then tries getting her point across, “If you proceed much further down the much slippery slope, people around the world will stop admiring the good things about you.” (18). Interpreting that America’s becoming bogus and is abandoning the rule of law. She then claims just as Great Britain had King Arthur’s spirit cast upon them in their darkest of times, America should summon upon ‘the great spirits’ that will help bring back a path of virtuosity in
“Anyway, when did you get so scared? You didn’t used to be easily frightened.” (18). Her little provocation had recalled from the past how America would jump to defend their nation. She conjured up some anger within some Americans patriotic enough to fight for the country. Many people around the world are concerned with the decisions that the U.S. is making regarding to war and protecting their country. Atwood’s harsh critique of America continues when explaining the amount of debt America is in and the “torching” of the American economy. “Keep spending at this rate and pretty soon you won’t be able to afford any big military adventures.” (18). Her charged description of “big military adventures” implicates the equipment that soldiers will need for going to war. Either that or America would go the way of the USSR and possess lots of tanks, but no air conditioning. With the attention finally captivated, she then tries getting her point across, “If you proceed much further down the much slippery slope, people around the world will stop admiring the good things about you.” (18). Interpreting that America’s becoming bogus and is abandoning the rule of law. She then claims just as Great Britain had King Arthur’s spirit cast upon them in their darkest of times, America should summon upon ‘the great spirits’ that will help bring back a path of virtuosity in