23 January 2014.
Think Before You Act
Margaret Atwood was born in Ottawa, Ontario , Canada, in 1939. she is known as a fiction writer. She has also taught literature and writing in universities in the United States and Canada. In the article the Debtor's Prism she states that the same stories we tell in books, are also reflected in our lives and this is the way she proves it.
In this article she claims that debts are something that is carried out from time to time. As well it has also left historical records in culture. Therefore, for any debt you have is a story left behind. How you go into debt, what you did to get out of debt, and what you did to deal with it. In "Debtor's Prism", she collects different kinds of evidence to support her claim.
Eric Berne's 1964 best selling book in transactional analysis, "Games People Play", Berne explains these games are most of the time played by two :
Patterns of behavior that can occupy an individual's entire lifespan, often destructively, but with hidden psychological benefits or payoffs that keep the games going. Needless to say, each game requires more than one player-some players being consciously complicit, others being unwitting dupes...(38)
Debts are something like what Berne explains in his book "Games People Plays" when we get into any kind of debt someone gets hurt.
Another good example of this is " A Christmas Carol" wrote in 1843 by Charles Dikens.
Ebenezer Scrooge is the main character. Scrooge is a greedy men that does not care about nothing else but sitting on piles of money. His job is to lend money to people and collect the money with interest. Everything changes after he is encountered by Marley the ghost. The ghost shows him all the burdens that he is carrying now after his death, because of all the people he had put in debt. The ghost tells Scrooge to start caring for other people. This is the moment when Scrooge starts making changes in the way he is spending his money. The writer states that Scrooge does not stop his business. Instead he starts sharing money with people that need it. (30-40)
I like the way Margaret Atwood links a fiction story with todays culture, because I get a better understanding in what it is to owe money to somebody else. I think if we found lenders that are not there to screw you with this out of range loan, the middle class people would have an opportunity to enjoy life more. I also think that having money is not a bad thing because money is the reward people earn for there hard work. It becomes an evil thing when we think, we need to have all the money in the world, no matter who we hurt to get it. It is like what Mr. Berne's wrote. When we get a mortgage its a pleage that we commit to. If you do not pay it, the lenders will take everything you have. Scrooge to me represesnt the creditors. They make you believe that they will help you by lending you money. What they really want to do is make you their slaves.
In this next paragraph, I will be explaining the reading process I used to understand the essay written by Margaret Atwood " Debtor's Prism." In reading this essay, I had to really think about how to use my reading skills properly because the article is kind of difficult to understand. At the beginning I got over whelemed with many thoughts coming into my mind, but I asked myself what needs to be done first. So I went to my room and I made sure the lighting of the room was enough so that I would not fall asleep. Next, I gathered all of my school supplies (textbook, paper, pens, dictionary, etc.) I also collected all of the class notes I had taken after I read the article once. When I got back to the book again, I read each idea that the writer had talked about and wrote my understanding of the passage. While I was reading, I also came across with vocabulary words that I looked up in the dictionary, then I continued with the reading. If there was a passage I could not understand after reading it a couple of times, I left it alone. Also I made sure I took breaks in between to avoid getting confused. Lastly, when I finished reading, I read all of my notes and left the useful ones and crossed out the others.
Professor asked us to write a claim and to analize this claim. This is what I came up with:
The way she supports this idea is by bringing up. "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens. Scrooge gives his soul to the devil so that he could have more and more money.Without knowing that it would become an idol to him. During the nights, he was visited by the chrismast past, christmas present, and christmas future ghost. Scrooge goes into these different times to reflect on his life. Scrooge learns that if he would be better off dead than to continue on being greedy because of all the people he took advantage of. Scrooge probably did not know that he made a pact with the devil, but what we are sure of is that the author knew it. I agreed with Atwood beacause the purpose of money is to serve you, not for you to serve money. This happened to Scrooge and it almost cost him his life. Atwood's was able to prove this to me because she showed me that debts are a reality that goes generations to generation, and the way she uses a fiction story to bring her point across. It was a cleaver idea, I could clearly see her point.
Work Cited"A Christmas Carol". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2014. Web. 22 Jan. 2014