Unit Six: The Death of the Moth; Warm-up with Question 10 on page 118. Death is Cessation of life functions. This can involve the whole organism (somatic death), individual organs (organ death), individual cells (cellular death), and individual parts of cells (organelle death). Thanatology is the academic, and often scientific, study of death. Some sayings about Life and Death Death means breaking through the barrier of space and time. (Beverly Brodsky) Death is actually a rebirth into a greater life of understanding and knowledge that stretches forward and backward in time. (John Star) Death means dying to the physical world. It also means being born into the spirit world. When we are born into this physical world, we fall asleep and forget who we really are. When we are born into the spirit world, we awaken and remember who we really are. Life does not end when we die. Death is a rebirth into a spirit world of light and love, a transition from the physical to the spiritual that is no more frightening or painful than passing between rooms through an open doorway. It is a joyful homecoming to our natural home. There are so many different descriptions of deaths because there are so many different perceptions, perspectives, beliefs, biases, backgrounds, and afterlife realms to fit them. Structural Analysis of Text A I.Background ( pa 1 )A seemingly smug common hay-colored under-wing (moth) found asleep in the shadow of the curtain in the background of vitality and vigor of life represented by human beings and other creatures on a fine mid-September morning. II.Detailed description of the moths Darwinian struggle for survival( pas 24 )2.1Omens of the moths hard doomed fate.( 2 ) 2.2The moths dignified struggle against his doom.( 3 )2.3The moths desperate protest against death.( 4 ) III. Conclusion ( pa 5 ):A description of the moths dying grace and the writers interpretation of the moths death: death is stronger than life; life is mortal but death eternal. Stylistic Features of the Text A.Synonyms: The use of several synonyms together to amplify or explain a given subject or term. A kind of repetition that adds force: 1.pity (2) pathetic (2,3) sympathies (5) 2.useless, helplessness, futile, vainly, failure (4) 3.hard fate (2), oncoming doom (5), death, dead, B. Contrast: life and death; dark and bright; individual and massive; up in the sky and down on the ground; vast, big, gigantic, magnitude and small, minute, tiny, diminutive; natural and supernatural C. Figures of speech: 1.Simile:The rooks too were keeping one of their annual festivities; soaring round the tree-tops until it looked as if a vast nest with thousands of black knots in it has been cast up into the air; which, after a few moments sank slowly down upon the trees until every twig seemed to have known at the end of it. Then, suddenly, the net would be thrown into the air again in a wider circle this time, with the utmost clamor and vociferation, as though it be thrown into the air and settle slowly down upon the tree-tops were a tremendously exciting experience. 2.Parallelism:That was all he could do, in spite of the size of the downs, the width of the sky, the far-off smoke of the houses, and the romantic voice, now and then, of a steamer out at sea. 3.Personification:As I looked at the dead moth, this minute wayside triumph of so great a force over so mean an antagonist filled me with wonder.(pa 5) D.Formal style: The same energy which inspired the rooks, the ploughmen, the horses, and even, it seemed, the lean bare-backed downs, sent the moth fluttering from side to side of his square of the open window-pane. (pa 2) Yet, because he was so small, and so simple a form of energy that was rolling in at the open window and driving its way through so many marrow and intricate corridors in my own brain and in those of other human beings, there was something marvelous as well as pathetic about him.(3) As I looked at the dead moth, this minute wayside triumph of so great a force over so mean an antagonist filled me with wonder. (pa 5) Critique 好的文章，就像一张精心织就的语言之网。透过这张网，我们看到的是一个似曾相识 但又全然不同于日常经历的现实世界。在这个世界里，事物还是普通事物，但彼此间的联 系却绝不普通。正是这些崭新的关联，使我们认识到一个真实的世界，也许比我们处身其 中的那个世界更加真实。 飞蛾之死为我们展示的就是这样一个世界。一切都平凡无奇，飞蛾、田野，阳光、 丘陵、窗户、乌兽，人群、房屋，城市，还有置身其中而又超然其外的观察者。然而，当 世界的中心定格在一只濒死的飞蛾身上，而其它一切都成为背景，一个人们从未经历过， 从未看到过的世界便诞生了，时间被压缩，熟悉的变为陌生，而遥远的变得近在咫尺。 这个以一只飞蛾为中心的世界是一个自足的完整的世界。尽管这个世界包含了许多其 它事物，但此刻这些事物并不具有独立的价值。它们仅仅是为了这只飞蛾而存在，为了印 证和反衬飞蛾之死。一旦飞蛾的历程结束，它们的使命也就该结束了。在这个新世界中， 作者为我们展现了一个生命的过程。从生到死的历程在瞬息之间。在我们的鼻子底下展开。 这对我们日常的碌碌生活无疑是一种震撼。在时间一天天缓慢地流逝中，生命对我们而言 早已熟视无睹，它似乎已经跳出了我们所能感受的范围，只潜存在我们无意识的语言与行 为之中。然而一只飞蛾的经历却将生死的过程以一种极度浓缩的方式释放出来，隔着一个 陌生的距离，渗入我们的日常体验。正是在这种意义上，这只飞蛾才跟我们的生命紧紧连 在一起，使我们清晰地体验到生命的脆弱与坚强。 Further study topics Darwinism; Naturalism Modernism Stream of consciousnessText B: Death of a MothStructural Analysis of the Text I.The carcasses of some insects, particularly those of moths, remind the narrator of an incident in which a moth i