Comparison

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Comparative Studies between Two Essays

“The Brown Wasps” by Loren C. Eiseley and “The Spider and the Wasp” by Alexander Petrunkevitch are two essays from the same book, “Decker Patterns of Exposition”, by Randall E. Pecker and Robert A. Schwegler, published by Scott, Foresman & Co., Greenview, Illinois, London, England.

It is obvious that the two essays use the same object, wasp, which is not a kind of insect easily seen or found. Both authors try to make this little creature his main character in the essay, for different purposes of course. In "The Brown Wasps", Loren gives wasp some symbolic meanings, and compare human beings including himself with the wasp. “Like the brown wasp, he will have his wish to die in the great droning center of the hive rather than in some lonely room.” (P. 130) “Prematurely I am one of the brown wasps and I often sit with them in the great droning hive of the station, dreaming sometimes of a certain tree.” (P. 135) Wasp has become a symbol in Loren’s essay, which is very much different from it is in Alexander’s "The Spider and the Wasp" . This time, wasp is the “archenemy” of the tarantula, a kind of spider. The author tries to tell the readers something about instinctive actions such as the battle between the tarantula and Pepsis, a kind of wasp. “The case I propose to describe here is that of the tarantula spiders and their archenemy, the digger wasps of the genus Pepsis.” (P. 165) Here wasp is nothing but only a natural enemy of tarantula, or we may say, a natural partner of the spider in the long evolvement in the history. Different purposes lead to the different position and usage of the same hairy creature, wasp.

As we have mentioned above, two authors are doing the different things out of different themes. Loren , who is admired for his sensitive philosophical approach to all living things, is watching the world changing nearby all the time. He is searching a...