Read this excerpt from John Steinbeck's "Symptoms," which describes soldiers' horrific experiences in the war. How does the author increase the
emotional power of his essay?
This is how you feel after a few days of constant firing. Your skin feels thick and insensitive. There is a salty taste in your mouth. A hard, painful
knot is in your stomach where the food is undigested. Your eyes do not pick up much detail and the sharp outlines of objects are slightly blurred
Everything looks a little unreal. When you walk, your feet hardly seem to touch the ground and there is a floaty feeling all over your body. Even
the time sense seems to be changed. Men who are really moving at a normal pace seem to take forever to pass a given point. And when you
move it seems to you that you are very much slowed down, although actually you are probably moving more quickly than you normally do.
Steinbeck describes the physical effects of war, such as "thick and insensitive skin and "salty taste" in the mouth. These graphic descriptions in
the present tense attempt to show the gruesome reality of war to readers.
2. Steinbeck describes the otherworldly feelings and strange hallucinations felt by the soldiers to highlight how most people have a difficult time
comprehending war events
3. Steinbeck argues about the negative effect of war on soldiers, such as fatigue, mood swings, and post-traumatic stress disorders, to persuade
his readers to be antiwar and support peace.
4. Steinbeck uses the pronoun you while describing the horrific experiences of the soldiers. In this way, he makes the soldiers' suffering more
relatable to his audience.
5. Steinbeck uses scientific evaluation to analyze the negative physical and psychological effects of combat warfare and bombing raids, such as
blurred eyesight, hallucinations, and disrupted digestion.