Blog 3

I was assigned George Saunders, "on the Importance of kindness." Throughout the video I watched, I acknowledged many aspects of writing voice. This allowed me to gather information and further understand the message of the video.




Narrative
The first writing voice technique that I acknowledged as the audience was Saunders use of imagery. I noticed this in the description of Ellen. George states, "Ellen was small, shy, and she wore these cats eye glasses that only old ladies wore at the time." This description gave me a glimpse of the appearance of this character. Another example of imagery is when he says, "When she was nervous, which was pretty much always, she had a habit of putting a strand of hair in her mouth and chewing on it." This example gave me an insight of what Ellen's personality may have been like, and led me to the conclusion that she may be semi antisocial and uncomfortable in certain situations.


Perceptivity
George Saunders does a great job of describing this character and helping us feel empathy for her. Mid way through the video we can see that the writer shows insight regarding Ellen. He no longer is describing Ellen in a surface level way but allows us to really dig deeper as he says, "I could see this hurt her. I still remember the way she looked after such an insult." This phrase not only allows us to understand what Ellen had to deal with but gave us further details on her reactions and responses.


Surprising information
As the video continues we learn not only about Ellen, but about George as well. As he transitions from his story about Ellen to his personal feelings he states, "What I regret most in my life are my failures of kindness." I consider this a quote that the audience was not expecting and we learn more about Saunders intentions and thoughts. I believe this allows a shift to a more serious tone.