Life in the Iron Mills & How the Other Half Lives

The pattern of ideas in Life in the Iron Mills is dominated by a reformist ethos that borders on the revolutionary. From the first paragraph of the narrative onward, the strategy is clear: to describe a set of conditions in such in harsh, unremitting, uncomfortable detail that any attentive reader would be moved to action against the conditions. The overarching message, implicit not only in the details of environment but also in the details of human experience and psychology within that environment, is that these conditions must be altered and that they can be altered. The principal assumption that Davis brings to the narrative is moral and more, that the same moral assumptions are brought to the reading enterprise by the reader.

The moral climate of Life in the Iron Mills is the foundation of its linguistic power, and once it is clear that both writer and readers share the same general W

. . .
nd direct personal observation; the reader discovers along with the writer what today would be called the breaking story. Engagement and immediacy are essential in any reform project. Readers must care about issues and people before reform can take place. This explains the "choice" the narrator makes to tell the story of Hugh, the artist trapped in a consumptive body and desperate mind whose art wastes away in squalor; and of Deborah, the hunchback whose hulking figure conceals a good heart and whose limited mental powers cause her to mistake picking the pocket of Mr. May for a clever way for Hugh to escape the mill and concentrate on sculpture. Now of course Life in the Iron Mills is sentimental melodrama, but the higher truth, that Hugh and Deborah are victims of systemic injustice, is reinforced by the concrete truths of their physical existence. The journalistic eye of Riis in How the Other Half Lives does not move toward narrative fiction, but that is profoundly the point. Riis's essay text is accompanied by photographs, and new information conveyed by images and the explanation of them is no less intended than Life in the Iron Mills to excite the care and concern of readers. How the Other Half Lives reports in some de
. . .

Some common words found in the essay are:
Iron Mills, Hugh Wolfe, Half Lives, Russian Polish, Herd Riis, Bandit's Roost, York Times, Jacob Riis, York City, Raft Medusa, life iron, life iron mills, iron mills, half lives, rebecca harding, hugh wolfe, riis's photographs, explains example, riis 49, york's slums,
Approximate Word count = 1755
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)

More Essays on Life in the Iron Mills & How the Other Half Lives