<p>This is an essay from 5th practice test in the blue book. </p>
<p>The topic was: "Do we need other people in order to understand ourselves?" </p>
<p>Here's my response:</p>
<p>Our lives are shaped entirely by the people we know. As children we are born without knowledge and opinions, yet as we grow these develop through our interaction with others. Therefore, it would be plausible to say that we truly do not understand ourselves without other people because those other people are the ones that mold our lives. In Oscar Wilde's novel, The Picture of Dorian Grey, Dorian Grey is a perfect example of a person who reached a better understanding of himself through the influence of another. Although Dorian Grey seemed to be a grounded fellow at the beginning of the novel, he reached a fuller understanding of himself through his interaction with Lord Henry.</p>
<p>Dorian Grey was a naive lad when he first met Lord Henry. Lord Henry was a man of shocking views on controversial topics such as marriage, while Dorian was a sheltered eighteen year old boy with fanciful notions of wedding a woman he had only glimpsed a few times. Lord Henry quickly squashed any chances of Dorian's marriage, convincing Dorian of his opinion that marriage would be an unhappy union. In fact, many of Lord Henry's opinions changed Dorian Grey's views on life in what could be seen as a harmful way. Surely Dorian's marriage wouldn't have been as unhappy as Lord Henry exaggerated. Nevertheless, Dorian acquised to Lord Henry's opinion of the dreadful union called marriage and reached a new understanding of himself. Through his interaction with Lord Henry, Dorian Grey realized that he was too young and naive to marry. And that is percisely why we need others to understand ourselves, because their opinons often cause us to develop an epiphany on the subject matter of life.</p>
<p>The scale is from 0-6 I believe and thanks for helping!</p>