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English 255: Hershinow Third mini-essay on Dogside Story A Life in the Shadows Since the accident that killed his two closest cousins, Shania and Taku, Rua has never been able to recover. (Hey--that "never" takes him up to the present time, and he IS recovering. So you need to re-state: "has been slow to recover") His inability to properly cope (with) and face the loss of his best friends and the loss of one of his legs has led him to a life in hiding, away from the rest of the village, in the dark protection of the trees. Rua claims he lives a solitary existence because it gives him a "physical life" when in actuality all it has ever done for him has been to provide a hiding place from the haunting truth--that he and his (half-)sister, Ani Wainoa, broke the rules of his society and culture and had a child together. (try the sentence without your firrst two commas, and then notice that you have identified two DIFFERENT causes of Rua's incomplete recovery.) "He'd allowed the truth to come to him--rejecting it at first, and then having to accept--allowing understanding to edge its way in, the secret for life that had to be left with the treesî"(102). (Never begin a paragraph with a quotation. Your own voice has to make a point, set the stage, and help us to see what the quotation you offer is doing to nail down the point you are making) The only witness to their incest(drop "ual crime" as you say the word at the sentence's end) was the trees, swaying this way and that, almost in a unified voice proclaiming the immortality (enduring nature? Lasting stain?) of their crime. Rua, at this point in his life, has lived in (private? personal?) acknowledgment of his crime only(;) he has not been able to accept full responsibility for his actions or admit to anyone beside himself that Kid was his child. (try this sentence without the "though" and with a semi-colon. The two independent clauses fit each other, and do not oppose each other, logically.) At nineteen, Rua realized that he was the father of Kid and Ani Wainoa (was both Kiri's mother and his sister)(,)and began his life of solitary confinement. (Don't begin with what sounds like story-telling or narrative. You are only allowed to make and THEN back pro-thesis points, and are expected to highlight these sub-arguments or thesis supports at the beginning of paragraphs. Following the accident in which he lost his leg and his (closest) cousins, Rua found that he was incapable of either leaving his home for a university or staying out in the "front" with his aunties and uncles. He attempted to fill gap below his knee with something he termed a "physical life.." Life out front meant being trapped in front of infomercials, Days of our Lives and Ricki Lake along with aunties, grandfathers and truants. It meant everyone running around after him not allowing him to do anything for himself.
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