Sample Analysis of a Story of Self
I’ve highlighted each question in a different color and then highlighted the part(s) of the text that helped me answer that question in the same color.
Story of Self: Brilliant Imperfection by Eli Clare
What is this? An excerpt from Clare’s nonfiction book Brilliant Imperfection (2017)
Text:
When nondisabled folks ask me whether I’d take the imaginary cure pill for cerebral palsy, I know what my answer is supposed to be. My questioners expect me to say, “Yes, of course, I’d take that pill in a heartbeat.” And when I don’t, they’re puzzled and disbelieving. They wonder if I protest too much or am defending myself against the unpleasant truth of my misery. How can I possibly not want a cure?
It’s simple. Having shaky hands and shaky balance isn’t as awful as they imagine, even when I slip, totter, descend stairs one slow step at a time. My relationship to gravity is ambivalent. On mountain trails, I yearn to fly downhill, feet touching ground, pushing off, smooth and fluid. Instead on steep stretches I drop down onto my butt and slide along using both my hands and feet, for a moment becoming a four-legged animal. Only then do I see the swirl marks that glaciers left in the granite, tiny orange newts climbing among the tree roots, otherworldly fungi growing on rotten logs. My shaky balance gives me this intimacy with mountains.
I would lose so much if that imaginary cure pill actually existed. Its absence lets me be unequivocal. It opens the door to brilliant imperfection.
Analysis
- What aspect of selfhood is this writer focusing on?
- What are the moments or events they focus on in relation to that aspect of selfhood?
- What is the tone of this piece? Or, how does this writer feel about the aspect of selfhood they are writing about?
- What details and images do they use to communicate that tone/feeling?
- What are three words you would use to describe this writer, based on this piece of writing? What can you tell about their personality, values, or passions?
Aspects of Self
- His disability: cerebral palsy
Moments or events referenced
- being asked if he would take a pill to cure his disability
- dropping onto his butt on mountain trails + feeling connected to the mountain landscape
Tone or feeling
- grateful
- awed
Details & images that create tone
- “slip, totter, descend stairs one slow step at a time”
- “swirl marks that glaciers left in the granite”
- “tiny orange newts”
- “otherworldly fungi growing on rotten logs”
3 words to describe writer
- Nature-loving
- Appreciative of difference
- Resilient