A Walk In The Woods Rhetorical Devices

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Pages: 5
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Linh Nguyen
English II
Summer Reading Assignment - A Walk in the Woods
Imagine, if you will, lying in the dark alone in a little tent, nothing but a few microns of trembling nylon between you and the chill night air, listening to a 400 pound bear moving around your campsite. Imagine its quiet grunts and mysterious snufflings, the clatter of upended cookware and sounds of moist gnawings, the pad of its feet and the heaviness of its breath, the singing brush of its haunch along your tent side. Imagine the hot flood of adrenaline, that unwelcome tingling in the back of your arms, at the sudden rough bump of its snout against the foot of your tent, the alarming wild wobble of your frail shell as it roots through the backpack that you left casually …show more content…
He uses a light humorous tone to entertain the readers, as seen towards the end of the passage. The repetition of “imagine” gives more interaction between the author and the reader and helps the reader understand how the experience feels by using sensory imagery. The passage is from the beginning of the book, so perhaps it foreshadows Bryson’s encounter with a bear in chapter 11. The diction in this passage is to give the reader an eerie mood by using words such as “unwelcome tingling” and “frail shell.” Bryson uses parallelism in his style in this passage as he constantly begins phrases with “the” to emphasize the many emotions.

“It’s awful. Everyone’s really upset about it, because trust is such a kind of bedrock part of hiking the AT, you know? I thru-hiked myself in 1987, so I know how much you come to rely on the goodness of strangers. The trail is really all about that, isn't it? And to have that taken away, well….”(Bryson, …show more content…
As he stated, he was so accustomed to safety that he wasn’t prepared for any attacks. However, this passage is the beginning of his character development. He is unready in this situation, but he becomes more acquainted with the nature as the story progresses. Personally, I find it humorous how he “reached instinctively” for his knife when he’s never been in this situation before. Also, the use of his simile, “like ants when you disturb their nest,” illustrates how scatterbrained he was in a fearful situation. The short sentence at the end of the passage gives it an unpleasant tone, especially in contrast to the previous lengthy sentence. This passage shows that in the woods, you have to be prepared for anything at all
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