<p>Prompt: Many people deny that stories about characters and events that are not real can teach us about ourselves or about the world around us. They claim that literature does not offer us worthwhile information about the real world. These people argue that the feelings and ideas we gain from books and stories obstruct, rather than contribute to, clear thought. Adapted from Jennifer L. McMahon, "The Function of Fiction" Assignment: Can books and stories about characters and events that are not real teach us anything useful? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.</p>
<p>Essay:
We may turn to history to examine past mistakes and successes, and from history, we learn to build a better future. However, fiction is what inspires and incites the human imagination, allowing for innovations and progress.</p>
<p>History teaches us what has already happened, but only fiction shows us what could happen. Many fiction novels warn us of the disasters that could ensue from current human vices. In Margaret Atwoods The Handmaids Tale, extreme pollution and chemical spills resulted in high infertility rates. Reacting to the possibility of human extinction, the government coerces fertile women into becoming handmaids, who bear children for all infertile couples by unwilling sex with the husbands. Even more pertinent to the subject at hand is Ray Bradburys novel Fahrenheit 451. In this story, all books are illegal and must be burned because they contain information that is unreal and useless. Without books, the citizens put on a pretense of happiness and bliss. In reality, a sense of hopelessness underlies the community because along with the fictional books, many human emotions are lost forever.</p>
<p>I have personally learned many life values and viewpoints from stories I have read. In elementary school a book impressed on me the importance of forgiving very deeply. To this day I am still affected by that book, and I am thus not one to hold grudges. Essentially, fiction books engage readers so that the messages the books carry come across strongly and serve as important life lessons.</p>
<p>In conclusion, fiction contains numerous ways to influence our minds and to catalyze new experiences. Not only the past or present contains vital information; fiction offers another method of preparing for the future.</p>
<p>Please tell me what you would score it on a scale of 1 to 12. (I know it should be 1 to 6 but they add up two graders scores for the actual thing) Thank you! I want to hear feedback, then I'll tell you what my problem is...</p>