Understanding “Live in Myths” by Ellen Goodman

Understanding “Live in Myths” by Ellen Goodman

 The essay by Ellen Goodman “Live in Myths” is actually about the people’s tendency to live in their own myths. For example, the author uses her friend as an example. Her friend is living in her myths that she has a husband who are not really cranky but in fact he is cranky, a husband who really, deep down, very generous, but in fact he is not. The authors’ friend is living in her really good expectation or we can say a good concept about the image of her husband. She chooses to stick with the image of her husband (he is really…..)  That she built by herself because she believes and want her husband to be like that. This essay is more about the result of the author’s observation about human nature when they describe what the other person is really like, they often picture what they want or illusion about others and they are afraid “if they let go the illusions, they will not like each other” (Ellen).

About the diction, it is refers to the author’s choice of word. Diction creates the color and texture of the written work; they both reflect and determine the level of formality; they shape the reader’s perceptions. (Tata, ppt read4_meet3). As we can see in this essay, the author uses some words to focusing in shape the reader’s perception about the issue that she wants to bring in this essay. For example, the author used the word “Erratic” which followed by the word “outbursts” to explain about the character of her friend’s husband. The author uses these words to makes clear about the real quality of the husband which denied by the wife. And in this case, the author also uses the word “Really” to explain the habit of the wife, where she is always stick with the concept or image of her husband and ignored the “real” quality of his husband because there is a “bound to be let down” thing.

Still talking about the diction, when we were asked to analyzing the diction, there are some questions to guide us to analyze that. Starts from is the language concrete or abstract? Do the words have interesting connotations? Is the diction formal or colloquial? Is there any change in the level of diction in the passage?  And what can the reader infer about the speaker or the speaker’s attitude from the word choice? (Tata, ppt read4_meet3). And for analyzing Ellen’s essay, I will use some questions. First, do the words have interesting connotations? And the answer is yes. We can see, in here, Ellen use the word “Really”, at paragraph 11, “I know many other people who live with their ideas of each other. Not with a real person but a “Really”.  In here we can see clearly that behind this word, the author wants the reader to understand about a feeling or idea that is suggested by this word which is said that many other people who live with their ideas of each other, stick with this idea by saying this person is really blablabla or this person is not really blablabla by ignored the real quality of this or that person that they were talking about. They are stuck with this image of the person that they built by themselves and when they ignored the Real fact or the illusions, they afraid it will makes them not like each other, “bound to be let down” (Last Paragraph).  

In my understanding, the diction “Really” that used by the author is an abstract diction. “Abstract diction refers to words that do not appeal imaginatively to the reader's senses. Abstract words create no "mental picture" or any other imagined sensations for readers.” (Tata, ppt read4_meet3). In this essay the word “really” is totally not appealed our imaginative sense or create no mental picture in our mind. We just directly understanding the purpose of the author by used the word “really” to describe the human  nature, about human effort go into maintaining the “really”.

In this essay, as I said before, the authors’ purpose by writing this essay is inform us the readers about human nature who lives in “really” but not “real”. Showing by some statements, for example, “-Live with their ideas of each other. Not with a real person but with ‘Really’, (par.11) ”They develop an idea about the other person and spend a lifetime trying to make him or her live up to that idea”, (par.11), “But when we describe what the other person is really like, I suppose we often picture what we want”(par.13), “we often refuse to see what we might not be able to live with”(par.17), “-about how much human effort can go into maintaining the “really”. How much daily energy that might have gone understanding the reality --accepting it or rejecting it.”(par.18). from those statements above, we can conclude that the purpose is all at once to inform and criticize about this tendency of people, to not live in myths which represent by the word “really”.

It seems like the author wants to say that we must brave to face the reality. In this case is about creating the image, picture, or illusions of somebody. We should not create that because we want them to be like that, but because the reality says that they are like that. We cannot live under the expectation about others that we create because we are “bound to be let down”. 

And the last is about the significance of the tittle to the content of the essay. In here the author pick “Live in Myths” as the tittle. I was explained about this before. The content of this essay is about the tendency of people to live under the image or illusion about others because they want or expected others to be like that. And Ellen uses her friend as an example. The authors’ friend is living in her really good expectation or we can say a good concept about the image of her husband. She chooses to stick with the image of her husband (he is really or he is not really…..). Further we draw this to the relation with tittle used by the author “live in myths”. Meaning to say that people tend to lives in their “really” which is not real are just the same with “live in myts”.