Salvation by Langston Hughes and Her Socialist Years by Helen Keller - Reaction Paper Example

Most narratives that depict particular messages tend to have lasting impacts, and that is why till now most people can associate with them. They can be either fictitious or non-fictitious such that they present issues that people can easily relate to them. Salvation by Langston Hughes and Helen Keller: Her Socialist Years are such stories that aim at presenting certain views that people can associate with. By analyzing and explaining the themes of the stories, Salvation and Her Socialist Years, it becomes easier to personally relate to the stories in regards to their non-fictitious nature.

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Salvation by Langston Hughes presents a narration of the experience of the author with religion while still a young boy. The title is ironical in regards to the type of salvation that the young Hughes experiences. The story ends with him becoming more confused on the issue of salvation since he does not experience salvation when the story ends. He pretends to see the light due to the social pressures from other believers in the church (Hughes, 2002). The main theme in the story is a religion from the perspective of a child and how it differs from the adults perspectives. Auntie Reed significantly contributes to the loss of faith in Christianity by the young Hughes. Auntie Reed tells Hughes "when you were saved you saw a light, and something happened to your insides!" (Hughes, 2002) Which can be perceived to be a vague explanation of salvation to a child as Hughes takes this explanation literally. In other words, Hughes expected to see the light and feel some changes in his body when experiencing salvation. When the light does not appear, Hughes gets confused such that he rejects the belief in Jesus Christ. Westleys false salvation contributes greatly to Hughes doubts on salvation. The social pressures from the adults make him pretend that he received the light such that he feels bad for lying. The evening after the service, Hughes drops to tears due to guilt and hence illustrating that he knew about the commandment on lying and hence a faithful Christian. Auntie Reed perceives the crying as an experience of the Holy Ghost whereby she explains to her husband that that was the reason for Hughes crying (Hughes, 2002). From a general perspective, the story illustrates the misunderstandings that adults have when it comes to the perspective of faith for children. In other words, children are expected to follow what the adults tell them regarding faith. From a personal perspective, Hughes experience of faith while being a naive child is an aspect that one can relate with. As a child, I would question some of the things regarding my belief and not get substantive answers. However, after growing up, I got to understand it more.

The story Helen Keller: Her Socialist Years begins with the assertion, For several months my name and socialism have often appeared together in the newspapers, (Keller, 2000) to show the scholars viewpoint or rather her beliefs. Therefore, the main theme in the story is socialism. She affirms to the belief of socialism whereby she gives details of how she came to the view and decided that she wanted to be a socialist. She explains that her teacher, Mrs. Macy was not a socialist but was on the verge of convincing her to share in her perspective. She provides details of the literature on socialism that she came across and the interaction she had with other individuals regarding the issue. However, she shows concern on how the newspapers on socialism havent shown interest in her views when compared to the other general newspapers. Keller ends with the statement, If I ever contribute to the Socialist movement the book that I sometimes dream of, I know what I shall name it: Industrial Blindness and Social Deafness, (Keller, 2000) to show her firm stand on socialism. From a personal perspective, socialism is quite a significant concept in our society especially as it promotes diversity in our modern day world. It is a concept that allows people to understand each other and live in unity.

Both stories are nonfiction whereby they illustrate logical situations that a reader can easily relate with. The scholars present their situations in the first person; a technique that allows the reader to empathize with their views. The issues of religion and socialism are present in our current world and hence real. Therefore, the scholars present real situations or rather events that took place in their lives in regards to their beliefs. From a personal perspective, imagination is not required for a work of nonfiction since it is something that has already happened or is happening. In order to present an issue that people can relate to, it is important to utilize aspects that are already present in the society; aspects that people identify and hence no need for imagination.

As stated earlier, by analyzing and explaining the themes of the stories, Salvation by Langston Hughes and Helen Keller: Her Socialist Years, it becomes easier to personally relate to the stories in regards to their non-fictitious nature. Both stories are narrated from the first person perspective and include situations that people can relate with and hence nonfiction. The stories expose one to the various perspectives that the scholars have in regards to the situations surrounding them. The perspectives allow one to question on his or her beliefs on the issues presented by both scholars.