this is water 读后感500字

A Review of This is Water

Do you really know what our life is? What you will be like in the future? What is most important to you? And perhaps you will get something from the article of David Foster Wallace.

Here is a review of the commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace to the 2005 graduating class at Kenyon College named “This is Water”. Maybe the water is the environment of our life. In this speech, as the author said he is not a wise old fish and he didn’t tell us what we should do or what we are supposed to think. He just told us the experience of his own life, what the world is like before us and what we can do to live a satisfactory life, to make ourselves alive. Maybe the sentences above confused you that this speech is boring or preaching. But as one of the most famous commencement speeches, it is far from tedious. The author is a famous writer with several popular novels. In the speech, you can feel the ideas and thoughts from a man who swims in the water of life for over twenty years than we.

There are some humorous, meaningful sentences and full of parallel sentences. But as a speech, the most important part is whether it is interesting or attractive. So, the author here focuses a lot on a living example. He put up an example to tell us what “day in and day out” really means. It is such a part involves boredom, routine and petty frustration. It is an average day and you are tired after nine or ten hours’ hard work. Of course, you want to have a good supper, relax yourself and hit the rack early. But then you find no food at home, so you have to drive to the supermarket after your work now. And then you will find nothing is on your side. The crowded streets, the crowded aisles and the store is noisy, fluorescently lit. What’s worse is that there are full of slow old people, the spacey people and the ADHD kids in the supermarket. Finally, when you get everything ready, there is an unbelievable long checkout line waiting for you. Of course, the way back home is also a terrible journey. So do you want this day in and day out? Certainly not. But what if this is the situation you have to face? Will you be mad and feel meaningless? Now the author told us to think different, to be conscious. In a different way, we could be inspired. We should know

our aims, be aware of what is important to us and have something to worship, to follow all around your life. It is nothing to do with others, it’s totally about you. You can have a positive choice and stay conscious.

As far as I am concerned, I get a lot from it. As an individual person, all of us are different. For the future social life, we should be more conscious and independent. We can turn to others, but we should have our own decisions. Maybe something is not right or agrees with you. You are supposed to practice and have your own way. Also you should have your idol, your faith that you will follow in your whole life. Just like Russell, the longing for love, the search for knowledge and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind had governed all his life. It is important to have something to worship. And as the author said “It is about simple awareness—awareness of what is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight all around us”.