Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe and Persepolis, Essay Example

How important are genre and the use of stylistic features to our understanding and appreciation of the author’s purpose?

The author’s genres tells the reader what to expect. The author’s genre can be mystical, historical, horror, thriller, suspense, or romantic comedy. The writer’s stylistic features are like the signature of a great writer. The writer’s signature is different from any other writer’s style. The writer’s style can have a literary personality of its own with the authors own context, purpose, pace, rhythm, choice of words and sentence flows. The genre and the stylistic features provide a clear understanding about the author’s purpose of writing the specific piece. The most important point is the genre and stylistic features help us understand the themes and ideas the author is trying to articulate in the novel.

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

There is something special about the literary delivery of this novel. The author Chinua Achebe captures the tempo and language of the Ibo people. The words sounded as if one of the Ibo people were speaking in the novel. The author Chinua was English speaking but she did a phenomenal job of conveying the very essence and spirit of the native Igbo language. The genre is set in the post- colonial era which author’s novel was a true tragedy. The writers sentence flow was short but choppy to convey her ideas rather than a continue flow of thoughts. This fascinating literary novel was done in 3^rd person narrative. Chinua perspectives were expressed in splendid vivid and descriptive themes. The cadence was so interesting that the Ibo language or words would not be understand unless the reader look at the glossary of words, however, the Ibo words made sense even without the glossary. The author’s utilization of the Ibo words to describe nature, settings, events, or objects was spectacular in meaning. The reader was able to distinguish the meaning Ibo words such as objects was (obi) in the Ibo language. The reader was able to understand the content and meaning of the word just by the description.

Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

The novel by Marjane Satrapi called “Persepolis” is a very candid autobiographical story about society, childhood to adult experiences and back drop of war. The genre is Bildungsroman which is a novel that deals with the psychological aspects and ethical barometer from childhood to adulthood. The primary characteristics that makes a novel Bildungsroman is the pace of the novel that is always changing and the story must graduate from the child to adulthood. Another characteristics of bildungsroman genre is the story discusses the child’s growth and development while searching for the meaning of life in a social setting. The author does an excellent job of masking the pain and hurt of the violence, war, and persecution with humor. This humor allows a little girl to be able to cope mentally with the Iranian wars and violence. This novel can fit into a couple of categories including the first hand historical views of Islam as seen through the eyes of the little girl. The cadence of the novel is written with such vivid imagination and purposeful hindsight that draws the reader into the mind and perceptions of a little girl trying to understand the meaning of life. The most interesting part about the memoir of a child is the rhythm and pace that allows the reader to feel the emotional changes of a little girl.