TOW #5: "The Force That Drives the Flower"

In her analysis of life and death titled “The Force That Drives the Flower”, Annie Dillard adds a unique perspective to a very ancient and abstract question. She views life from the eyes of different species, and then ties back the similarities and differences to human life. Her piece includes many fascinating facts about how organisms live only to reproduce, explaining the nature of life and death through real world examples. As a Pulitzer Prize winner and English professor at Wesleyan University, Dillard is a very gifted writer and researcher. This piece would fascinate anyone interested in science, in addition to readers with philosophical minds. Dillard very effectively uses symbolism to express her ideas, and this helps the audience connect deeply to what she is saying. When explaining the life as the individual verses the group, Dillard says, “Instead of one goldfish swimming in its intricate bowl, I see tons and tons of goldfish laying and eating billions and billions of eggs. The point of all the eggs is of course to make goldfish one by one—nature loves the idea of the individual, if not the individual himself—and the point of a goldfish is pizazz. This is familiar ground. I merely failed to acknowledge that it is death that is spinning the globe” (Dillard 3). The idea of many goldfish in a bowl helps to personify a topic that is very hard to grasp, while at the same time offering an incredibly unique view. She also alludes to other scientists and great thinkers from different time periods. Dillard concludes her essay by writing, “The world came into being with the signing of the contract. A scientist calls it the Second Law of Thermodynamics. A poet says, "The force that through the green fuse drives the flower/ Drives my green age." This is what we know. The rest is gravy” (Dillard 3). By including the words of others in her essay, Dillard explains her ideas in many different ways to allow understanding. This well put together piece enabled Dillard to achieve her purpose of analyzing the complexity of life.