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(2016
midterm assignment) Sample Student Midterm Answers 2016 (index to #2 samples) #2a: Short Essay (Favorite Passage) |
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Austin Green
The Great Escape!
[109]
The reason for remaining so long was that
I wished to take with me a Christian
called Lope de Oviedo, who still lingered on the island. . . .
But year after year he put it off to the
year that was to follow. In the end I got him to come, took him away, and
carried him across the inlets and through four rivers on the coast, since he
could not swim. Thence we proceeded, together with several Indians . . . .
[110]
On the opposite shore we saw Indians who
had come to meet those in our company. They informed us that further on there
were three men like ourselves and told us their names. . . . We asked them
about those who remained alive, and they said they were in
a very sorry condition, as the boys and
other Indians, idlers and roughs, kicked them, slapped their faces and beat them
with sticks, and such was the life they had to lead.
[111]
We inquired about the country further on
and the sustenance that might be found in it. They said it was very thinly
settled, with nothing to eat, and the people dying from cold, as they had
neither hides nor anything else to protect their bodies. . . . And to show
us that what they said of the ill-treatment of our people was true:
the Indians with whom we were kicked and
beat my companion. . . . They threw mud at us, and put arrows to our chests
every day, saying they would kill us in the same way as our companions. And
fearing this, Lope de Oviedo, my
companion, said he preferred to go back, with some women of the Indians in whose
company we had forded the cove . . . .
He went back and I remained alone among
these Indians . . . .
----
My favorite passage from what we have read over the first half of the
semester so far was paragraphs 109-111 of Cabeza de Vaca’s La Relacion. It was
around this point in the reading where I realized I was no longer paying
attention to the style it was being written in, but was actively reading and
enjoying this like I would any other book. I feel you can see the beginnings of
literature as we know it now reflected in this reading. While it was a struggle
to start, by now I was fully into the story, curious to read what would happen
next.
This selection shows part of an escape during a captivity narrative. I
picked these specific paragraphs mainly for the start and the finish. We learn
that Cabeza de Vaca has put off his escape for six years, the reason being that
he wanted to take a fellow Christian named Lope de Oviedo with him. Lope de
Oviendo put off the escape year after year, until Cabeza de Vaca was finally
able to convince him to flee.
They finally flee along with several Indians, who tell the men that where
they are heading is a very hard place to live. There are not many settlements,
no food, and that they would likely die from the cold. To pile on the low
morale, the Indians they were with treated Cabeza de Vaca and Lope de Oviendo
very badly. They were threatened, and Oviendo was kicked and beaten. Lope de
Oviendo then decides, after making Cabeza de Vaca wait six years to finally
flee, to return back to the Indian camp they were living. He leaves. Cabeza de
Vaca is now alone with these Indians.
Again we’re left wondering if this is true, if this is how the story
really happened. It certainly makes Cabeza de Vaca look heroic, both in waiting
for a fellow Christian to escape, and then being left all alone with the Indians
who just beat his friend bad enough he no longer wanted to escape. I definitely
noticed that nowhere in this passage does Cabeza de Vaca come off as looking
bad. In fact, he specifically mentions how the Indians kicked and beat his
companion, but nothing is mentioned about him being beat. He is only threatened
and has mud thrown on him. While it’s nothing significant, I see this sort of
thing show up again and again in this work, and in John Smith’s A History of
Virginia. The person telling the story always ends up being the hero, or the
good guy.
I think that’s why this passage stuck with me so much. It’s framed as
this awful thing to happen to Cabeza de Vaca, but is it really? Yes, he waited
six years for his friend, who then bolts almost right away on the escape,
leaving him alone with these Indians. It just sets the odds even greater for his
success. He is definitely a story teller, and knew exactly what he was doing. It
shows me that ultimately, while we may look at these type of stories for its
historical information, it still is a story. It cannot be looked at as fact.
