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                                                                                                       Charles Daquial

            We can learn so much from reading stories and poems about the past

                                  And our present day across the world

          We can learn so much from stories and poems about the past and our present day across the world. Reading stories and poems can tell us how people lived in the past and in the present day in different places. We will learn what problems a society faced in the past. By reading stories and poems, we will know how people interacted with each other.  

            Reading stories and poems can tell us how people lived in the past and in the present day in different places. People across the world have different cultures and was shown by the stories that were written by different authors. People raised their children based on their cultures like what happened in the story “A Handful of Dates” by Tayeb Salih. The narrator stated how he lived when he was young. He would go to the mosque and learn Koran. He can recite the Chapter of Merciful whenever they had visitors and people would pat him on his head every time they see him with his grandfather.

            Stories also show how people lived based on their religion and beliefs. Islam is one of the biggest religion around the world. In the poem Ruba’iyat bu Omar Khayyam, he emphasized his belief that people should live their life to the fullest. He believed that people should be happy and enjoy their present life and don not wait until future. In this poem, he used the wine to represent the happiness that he called it “elixir of life” which means that drinking wine is the remedy on all of people’s problems.

            Languages, traditions and the way people talked were different in other places and time. In the story “Baby in the Icebox” by James A. Cain, he used vernacular language in the story to add effectiveness in the story. The people in the author’s time might have used that kind of language and is one reason why he wrote it that way. The characters spoke slang in the story and the narrator used vernacular language to describe and exaggerate things.

            Traditions were different in the past although some traditions today were still the same or changed. Based on the story “A Handful of Dates” by Tayeb Salih, Muslim children in the past were required to go to the mosque and learn Koran. The narrator in the story used to go to the mosque when he was a child and he studied Koran. In this story also, Masood married more than one woman based on the narrator’s grandfather.

            We will learn what problems a society faced in the past. Racism and discrimination were some of the biggest problems of a society before. Based on the poem “Advertisement for Waldorf-Astoria” by Langston Hughes, black people during that time were discriminated because of their color and race. People were facing poverty and hunger, but most of them were black people. The story stated about homeless black people and families with no one is working, girls who became whores just to earn money and survive. On the other hand, most of the white people had the power and rich during that time. The story states “Dine with some men and women who got rich off of your labor, who clip coupons with clean white fingers because your hands dug coal, drilled stone, sewed garments, poured steel to let other people draw dividends and live easy.” This also states that black people are doing the hard and dirty jobs and yet they get not enough to feed their families.

                 Poverty and hunger is still a problem of our society and in the past. It was shown in the poem “Advertisement of Waldorf-Astoria” by Langston Hughes and in the story “Vanka” by Anton Chekhov. In this story, a nine year old child was working at a very young age. He works for Alyahin as a shoemaker’s apprentice. The story showed how hungry and how hard the boy’s life that he always cry every day. He said that he only eats a bread in the morning and porridge for dinner, then bread again for the evening. He faced different maltreatment from the family he’s working on. He gets beaten up by every mistake he did.

            Injustice and power can be considered as one of the major problem in every society. In the story “The Saga of Hrafenkel Frey’s Godi”, a man named Einar was slain because he used a horse that is forbidden to be use. He was told about this before by Hrafenkel that he can use any horses that he wants except for the black horse. When Einar was killed and Thorbjorn found this out, he did not accept the offer of Hrafenkel, instead, he seek for help from his brothers for justice. Injustice was shown in this story when Hrafenkel humiliated and treated people unfairly just because he has the power which is the reason why some of Thorbjorn’s brothers were afraid to get involved in the case.

            By reading stories and poems, we will learn how people interacted with each other. People in the past had different treatment for visitors than people today. In the story “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves” by Hussain Haddawy, the captain of the forty thieves disguised himself as a merchant and asked Ali Baba if he can stay overnight with his horses loaded with jars. Ali Baba was a good hearted man so without hesitating, he accepted the merchant and welcomed him and treat him as a visitor. He made special foods and they became friends for a short period of time.

            People were influenced by other powerful people in different places and time. It was showed in the story “Man on the Pink Corner” by Jorge Luis Borges when the narrator stated in the story that they have great respect to this guy named Rosendo, who was known for his braveness and skills on knives. Even whores and boys would imitate him right down to the way he spit.

            Before, people will treat you based on your class in a society. There are many stories that showed unfair treatment to people especially if they do not have power and belongs to the lower class. The characters in the story “Hrafenkel Frey’s Godi” was treated unfairly because they do not have power like Hranfenkel. The young boy in the story “Vanka”, was not raised properly and treated as like an animal. The workers in the poem “United Fruit Co.” by Pablo Neruda, who were compared to “a bunch of lifeless fruit dumped in the rubbish heap” which means they do not get what they deserve because of corrupt officials and the United Fruit Company. Masood, in the story “A Handful of Dates” was not treated as before because he was in big debt to the narrator’s grandfather. He was like nothing every time they harvest plums and no one is giving him attention.

            Reading stories and poems from around the world can help us learn about the past and in our present day. We can learn how people lived in the past and we will know what problems societies have faced in different times and places. We will know how people treat and interacted with each other by reading stories and poems. These stories were just some many examples made by different authors that were inspired based on their lives in different times across the world. We can use these stories to learn from the mistakes done in the past such as improper use of power and authority, for treating people based on their race and class and more. We can learn different cultures that were practiced even the languages that they used. There is so much to learn by reading stories and poems about the past and our present day across the world.