Benjamin Franklin: Blog #1

Blog #1

Ben Franklin: Autobiography

 

When I began reading the first few paragraphs of his autobiography I found myself confused. In the beginning paragraphs he was talking of “felicity” and what it meant to him and how that “intense happiness” came about. Then as he was talking about wanting his son to know him and what his life entailed I found myself asking what is the goal of this? What does he want US the reader to get out of this? He talked a lot of regret and the retelling of one’s story. I found that I did agree with him that if given the chance to fix some of the mishaps we experience the first time around, we should take it. All of these questions were formed in the first four paragraphs of this autobiography, so I felt that this was going to be either really interesting or really tough.

On page 1 of chapter 2 in paragraph 2, I love how he just walks up to a group and people start accepting him, even if he is dirty. Nowadays you would not find that. I have yet to decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Also, I can feel his humor in some of his writings.  Right now I cannot find an example, but I will re-read and see what I find. For some reason in my notes I wrote “underlying tone of humor.”

Throughout chapter 6 I thought I was listening to a never-ending love song. Though, I get it. He lived a wonderful life, all these people were saying was how his life will touch others and if he did not publish his work then people will be missing out on a wonderful thing, while I do agree to this, I also feel like they put a lot of pressure on him. While reading it I imagined myself just completely feeling overwhelmed.