Three Questions

Watching Life is Beautiful inspired me to ask myself a few questions which I have chosen to answer in through this blog.

 

What is innocence?

The beauty of an unaffiliated, uninfluenced, and non-corrupt mind; pureness. An essence not to be misunderstood or associated with being naive and gullible but synonymous to concepts involving beauty and treasure. What is not yet tainted, what is not yet tarnished, what has remained beautiful; young. What evil cannot be inflicted upon, what beauty resides in. An inner beauty that has not been touched; what is clean. What can remain optimistic that which can remain warm and inviting and at the same time inspire hope; a cause worthy to fight and die for. That which is a light in the darkness. It is what is made curious and happy by the vastness and mysteries surrounding it. It is what smiles with its milk-teeth, it is what is naughty, mischievous and full of joy. It is what older souls find running around in fields chasing each other. It is what asks his mother to kiss his boo-boo after he falls down from his bicycle. It is what invites her father to her tea-parties. It is the child. The child is Innocence.

What is evil?

A mind soaked with the colour of blood, that never truly recovers, such as the bloodstains left on white cloth after it has been cleaned. It is what is paranoid and scarred. It is what is fearful and angry. It is what hateful and suffering self-inflicted pain. It is what deprives and kills the natural beauty of the creative and free spirit. It is the predator and the murderer of the child’s spirit; the spirit of innocence. It is sad and deformed. Dark and twisted. Vengeful and unkind. Bloody and unclean. What loves and at the same time hates pain. What destroys itself and everything; a virus. It is dis-balanced and plagued with quarrel. What allows seeds of hate and sorrow to grow and flourish into menacing trees, casting long, cold, lifeless shadows. Engulfing in a shroud of sheer darkness  whatever is unfortunate enough to fall within its reach. It is what holds you by the throat with its long icy fingers and watches your spirit die in agony. It is an entity that breaks wills and hearts and souls. It is what leaves a trails of cold blood and destruction in its path. It is what is weak and alone.

What is beauty?

This is a most difficult question I cannot answer. However I can say this: Look up. Look around. Look inside. It is without the shadow of a doubt indescribable. Simply far too abstract for us. Words simply cannot be fit. Beauty is not spoken, nor does it to us, yet it tells us something, it makes us feel something. Many poems and literary works were inspired by beauty. When we look up into the stars or the blue sky we are taken away by this awe-inspiring breath-taking; it is easily found and magnificent, now look up to your dreams. Are they not beautiful? Do they not hold some essence of beauty? Around us beauty is present, present in the novels we read, people we associate with, art we look at, places we go to, and our morals and beliefs; it is everywhere. When we look within ourselves is where individual beauty lies, it is unique, unique as our fingerprints. That is what is beautiful about it, the individuality it holds; its vastness and variety. It is this that manifests itself into our dreams and what gives a person the strength and will to believe. It is uniqueness, endless, and vast. 

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4 thoughts on “Three Questions

  1. Dear Nilave,
    Before I go into anything else, I want to tell you just how much this piece impressed me. It is a very in-depth reflection of ideals and concepts that we, as busy people, generally take for granted without thinking about what their true meaning may be. Because it is rare for people to actually stop and think about what these things- innocence, evil, and beauty- really mean to them, it delighted me to find that you, in fact, had done so in a very personal way. That, too, deserves applause- to put out there strong opinions on topics upon which others might have opinions that strongly oppose yours.
    I’ll begin by saying that the tone you use- which at times is a sort of beautiful, poetical lyricism, especially when you describe evil- to conjure images is amazing. I could see in my mind’s eye the little girl of innocence having a tea party with her reluctant but loving father, I could feel the poisonous, minacious trees of evil growing into a twisted forest. I can’t quite figure out how you did that; you didn’t describe these things in detail, instead you wrote with effective use of words and language while still writing enough to flavor the palette of the reader. You did not use imagery as a literary devise excessively; it was almost as if the imagery was the perfect amount of side-effect from the tone you used and impression you were trying to create for the reader. I am not certain as to whether this was intentional or even if I described it in a way that is understandable, but it worked well here and I loved it.
    As for some things that you could improve upon, I would have loved to see some images to enhance that magic of your words. It was too empty without visuals, and for me personally, I was not motivated to open the page of this piece under the category of your name because it had no image beside it to lure me in. This can be easily fixed and I hope you can bear it in mind for next time. 
    I know you to be a whimsical person with a million vibrant, unique thoughts racing around a constantly fluctuating mind. And yet I know that you have a depth to you that is unfathomable. That depth became incredibly clear to me through this piece; the voice that shone through your words is of a sophisticated man contemplating the meaning of everyday staples in life that the rest of us take for granted. I was thoroughly impressed at how your conveyed this. The lyricism to some of your lines surprised me- I would have expected you to write in a more straightforward manner, but after reading this piece I can’t imagine you writing in any other way. Your style and your voice conveys both the whimsicality and uniqueness of you personality, and also the depth to which I know you think.
    Another constructive criticism I have for you is to make the intention behind your word more clear. At some points, I found myself confused by what you meant; what you were trying to convey just wasn’t coming across to me, or maybe didn’t fit in the right place. For example, the line, It is what older souls find running around in fields chasing each other, in my opinion may not have fitted where it was placed in the section about innocence, as old souls are mature, world weary, and unfortunately do not have the luxury of much innocence. However, if you had provided some details upon why this line represents innocence, it would greatly help the reader to understand your intentions. I would also love it if you could explain to me what you meant here, as I am now curious! 🙂
    As another thing I think you did wonderfully, I want to speak to the structure of your piece; I think that you made a very powerful and eye-catching choice when it came to overall structure. Regarding the questions being on their own lines, it served to make the questions very hard-hitting, very real, and caused our own ignorance to be revealed when the reader tries to answer those questions themselves before reading your answer. This was a great choice and worked extremely well for you. Having your answers to the questions each be their own paragraphs worked well, too- it solidified the impression that each answer was unified around its question and it successfully separated the insightful answers from each other so that they didn’t bleed together. I loved the way you structured this piece- keep at it!
    There is absolute conviction behind your words, and it is very obvious that you believe in and are passionate about what you are saying. This is part of what inspired me in reading what you wrote, and is possibly my favorite thing about this piece. Altogether, you have written something amazing, something unforgettable, and something brilliant. Be proud of it, and never stop writing.
    Infinite Love and Gratitude,
    Ziyana

  2. Dear Nilave,

    As Miss Hunni has said in class, style is an incredibly difficult technique to master as your own. We all struggle when writing to decide what is the best way to deliver our ideas in our own voice. Even the best of writers will hit the backspace key multiple times while writing even a sentence.

    In this blog, I can see your style emerging and I love it! You’ve got a lot of things going in this piece – rhetorical questioning, imagery, syntax – and they all really work to add to the flow of your words and the strength of your voice. You’re soaking up all of Miss Hunni’s beautiful teaching very quickly; your writing has changed so much in the past month! I’m very appreciative that you’re in this class because your writing quite reminds me of my own when I first entered AP in grade ten. I know that this class is the right place for you to be. 🙂 I’m sure that your style will continue to develop and you’ll soon have a style that is just as unique as you describe beauty to be!

    One thing I would like to offer to you about this piece is to be aware of semicolons. I like how you used them in repeated ways to eccentuate your syntax and to add to your style, but I think in a few places they might have been used incorrectly. Other than that I loved this piece!

    -Ali

  3. Dear Nilave,

    I am truly blown away. I think that the idea you had, to answer the three questions that Life is Beautiful inspired you to think about, was genius. It shows anyone who reads this that you are a deep, critical thinker. Your word choices and style allow it to flow and the reader to become completely immersed in your writing. Your diction and description is amazing, it truly enhances the piece. Your ability to compare and contrast ideas with real life applications really shows what a strong writer you are. Also, the very ideas and concepts you touched on throughout the piece were incredible, it showed a lot of depth. Your thoughts on all of these words/concepts were incredible!
    I thought it was very interesting to be able to see into your mind and get to read your interpretation on what these words/concepts mean. It also shows the strength your writing has, as it has the ability to easily connect to and absorb the reader.
    Just be careful with some GUMPS, at times it can distract the reader. But I am the worst at GUMPS so I should really take my own advice!
    Thank you so much for sharing this beautiful piece with us. And congratulations on such a great post man.

    Sincerely,
    Tay

  4. Nilave,

    Wow. I absolutely loved this piece.

    I love that you started each of your paragraphs by asking a question. And, to the untrained eye, these questions would be simple. However, if you look closer, you realise that they are not. It is almost deceptive how something that sounds so simple can be so complicated and have so many different layers.

    I feel like you did these questions justice, for your answered them in a way that was your truth. There was an honestly about this piece that I loved, as well as a sense of torment as you tried to come up with an answer. There was a sense of conflict in your words that spoke to me. It was like two conflicting opinions lived inside of you and you were unsure which to act on, if that makes any sense at all.

    There is one this that you said, however, that I disagree with; “Beauty is not spoken. . .” I think you’re wrong. Beauty is spoken, and you are living proof of that, because what you wrote in your blog was beautiful. It’s like when you hear a word that just makes your breath hitch in your throat and you have to sit in silence for a second, because that one word left you in a state of wonder. Beauty is spoken every day; in class discussions that we have, in a baby’s first words, in professions of love, in music, and through writing just like what you have written here. So, I think that beauty can be spoken, but that’s just me.

    Thank you so much for writing this blog, as it truly made me think, and I loved every minute of it.

    Infinite love and gratitude,

    Hope

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