Annie Dillard Sacrifice
Mrs. Cooper’s challenge was to write an essay on Holy The Firm by Annie Dillard. The challenge comes not from being able to sum up enough words in enough time to meet the requirements of this assignment, but from being able to contain such vast information, learned and decoded out of the book, into an essay format, a container so small and structural that, like Annie Dillard did in her own writing, one must carefully decide which thoughts, quotes and ideas are most important, based on your essay topic, and squeeze them into a vessel for a reader, or listener, to understand and grasp your vast message. Annie Dillard did the same thing while writing Holy The Firm, she took her contained ideas on subjects including; Time, Reality, The Will of God, Death, Nature, and the theme I will be focusing on, Sacrifice. Holy The Firm, though full of questions, is just as much full of answers, that Annie Dillard came up with while secluding herself, aside from her cat, spider and community of neighbors, on an island in Puget Sound, for two years. While all of the previously listed themes are completely intertwined and overlap everywhere, I will use the best of my abilities to discuss mainly Annie Dillard’s views on Sacrifice, her questions and answers regarding what it is and the reasons for it. While Annie Dillard gives a complex, and hazy answer for the question of sacrifice, I will share my interpretation of that answer which Annie Dillard has shared with me. The reason for sacrifice is to bring us enlightenment of God’s power and the reality of His world. Throughout the book, one of the most commonly used motifs is a moth, whether it is being eaten by a spider, or burned on a candle, the moth’s death is a commonly used symbol for sacrifice. The moth is first brought up where it is being eaten by a spider, but the best imagery of the dying moth first appears on pages sixteen and seventeen, where a moth flies onto the candle and is burned to death. And I paraphrase this