Primo Levi's The Death Of The Moth

Death, Another Form of Living “Life and death” is always a thesis that has a lot can be discussed. Various people have various opinions on it. Many authors have written piles of books on this topic as well. In this passage, we use “Carbon”, a chapter from The Periodic Table written by Primo Levi, as a lens to see how the City of God which is written by E.L. Doctorow and “The death of the Moth” which is written by Virginia Woolf, these three articles organize and talk over about the general topic of the significance of life and death. Although they share the same thesis, three articles have different focuses, different attitudes and different writing angles on the meaning of life and death, giving us significant perceptions on life and death …show more content…
It is the energy that the moth struggles against death, the spirit that it doesn’t give up until the last minute, that composes life. “Watching him, it seemed as if a fibre, a very thin but pure, of the enormous energy of the world had been thrust into his frail and diminutive body.” (The death of the Moth) Woolf shows us the true nature of life with the example of moth. “He was little or nothing but life.” Although this little moth is only a minute living creature on earth, we still are moved and shake by its marvelous vitality, its adamancy against death. Hence, in this article, the author’s emotion changes from pathetic to redoubtable, giving us a deep thinking about life and …show more content…
The passage is written on the largest scale since the passage is anthropomorphized and we are from the angle of god. In an ironic way, shows how the universe, and the earth forms. For instance, the “Okay?” (Doctorow) at the end of the first paragraph shows that Doctorow is contrary to “the Big Bang theory”. His viewpoints all base on the largest scale — the earth, nature. And this shows the comparison between the world and human. The world is so large, while we human are so tiny and insignificant. Hence, we should fear the nature, fear the god. Take a close look at “The death of the Moth”, Woolf tells the whole story in a touching way, full of romanticism to depict how a moth struggled against the death before it died, even though it knew that there was no chance for it to win or to escape death, giving a thinking about life and death. The article gives a strong image to the little creature moth, and the transactions between “one” and “I” (Woolf) during the description, shows a method of “great to see small” to present sublime aesthetics of