Burgess and Crevecoeur

Anthony Burgess’s piece “Is America Falling Apart?” and Hector St. Jean Crevecoeur’s piece, “What is an American?” from Letters from an American Farmer both have unique tones in them discovered through their use or rhetorical devises. Burgess’s piece has a negative tone and, this can be identified by his use of tri-colons, anaphora, and his use of ethos. Crevecoeur’s piece has a positive tone and, this can be identified by his use of hypophora, anaphora, and his use of ethos. Initially, Burgess’s use of tri-colons and anaphora in his writing identifies the tone of his work. A good example of his negative tone and use of tri-colons is on page 288 where he states, “But there seemed to be no spark; no daring, no madness, no readiness…” He is referring to America and what we lack. Also, on page 287, “The wretched run-down down rail service… The nightmare of filth… But far worse is the nightmare of travel…” This is an example of an anaphora and Burgess’s negative tone towards the United States. Another example of anaphora is on page 287, “…mechanics grow more expensive… The more efficiently self-contained… the more dependent it is…”

Here he relates to the topic of America over pricing our wares. Subsequently, another rhetoric devise used to find Anthony’s tone is his use of ethos. By making the readers feel a connection to him, they are more likely to stand on his side against America with a negative tone. On page 288 there is an example of this, “Education, for instance, since I have a 6-year-old son to be brought up.” Anthony relates to his child and the horrible education he gets here in America. Pg 288, “The quality of first-grade education that my son received, in a New Jersey town noted for the excellence of its public schools, could not.” In this part of his piece Burgess mentions his opinion on education and secretly tries to get the reader to listen to take his side, “I know that American technical genius, and most of all the moon landings, seems to give the lie to too summary a condemnation of the educational system, but there is more to education than the segmental equipping of the mind.” Additionally, in Crevecoeur’s piece, “What is an American?” the use of hypophora and anaphora identifies his positive tone. By using hypophora constantly it gets the reader hyped about America and sets a positive tone for the overall document, an example of this is page 2, “…who owned not a single foot of the extensive surface of this planet? No!”

Another time Crevecoeur uses hypophora is on page 2 again, “ Pg 2, “…to what purpose should they ask one another what countrymen they are? Alas two-thirds of them had no country.” Here he speaks of how anyone can have a home no matter who they are, this is a very positive aspect of America. A use of anaphora is on page 1, “He must greatly rejoice that he lived… he must necessarily feel a share of national pride…” Here Hector speaks of how one should be happy to live in America. Furthermore, Hector’s use of ethos makes his tone easy to realize. On page 5 he refers to his father to try to get the reader to feel an attachment towards him, “…my father himself was one of that class… by good conduct and temperance, he transmitted to me his fair inheritance…”

Also on page 3 he has two quotes to help identify his positive tone through ethos, “He is an American, who, leaving behind him all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new ones from the new mode of life he has embraced, the new government he obeys, and the new rank he holds,” and , “From involuntary idleness, servile dependence, penury, and useless labour, he has passed to toils of a very different nature, rewarded by ample subsistence.–This is an American.” Two pieces of writing, Anthony Burgess’s piece “Is America Falling Apart?” and Hector St. Jean Crevecoeur’s piece, “What is an American?” from Letters from an American Farmer both have unique tones in them discovered through their use or rhetorical devises. Anaphora, hypophora, parallelism, tri-colons, and ethos were all used to identify these two tones; Burgess with a negative tone and Crevecoeur with a positive tone. Both these writers are very original and through rhetoric their tones were identified.