The Book of Jon Analysis

Deyanira Bustos

Joseph Cooper

CRWR 212 Y

May 6, 2014

Analysis of The Book of Jon

In the book, The book of Jon, Eleni Sikelianos creates many works such as letters, poems, pictures, and journal entries in order to capture the image of her father and his entire life. This was a very emotional and touching piece that provided various descriptions and images of her father. The author throughout her work provided imagery and different styles and techniques of writing in which she expressed all her feelings.

In one of her works in the book, Notes Towards a Film About My Father (Jon), is a distinct form and technique of writing. Throughout the work she questions “Why should I make a movie of him?” creating a questioning, yet confused and unsure tone throughout the work. This work demonstrates how she was not able to see her father often, but only “once a year” which then answers the question of her not being able to create a “movie” of her father because there would not be enough images to make the movie and portray her love for him.

The writing and style in this work also is very distinct because it includes slashes (/) in order to separate the words but slashes are usually used to represent “or”. The use of these slashes cause there to seem to be a pause between the words but she also includes the word “pause” in parentheses throughout the work. In her work she also includes various numbers to list of the “Stories” she has of her father. She goes off to describe things about her father but the story seems to be separated into numbers.

Imagery and her use of diction also play a big role throughout the whole work because she is trying to depict and describe her father to the reader. An example of imagery in her work is “ Before he got old and craggy” allowing the reader to see her father as an old man. The use of the word “craggy” is able to describe his “old”, uneven, and rough skin. Another description that she incorporated into her work was “The small voices of children escape from windows across the courtyard” this represents imagery as well as personification. Voices are just sounds but she provides them with the ability to “escape” and “rise” giving them humanly characteristics.

This was a very interesting and depressing story that describes her life but mainly the life of her fathers. It depicts the hard times as well as the good times that she lived through throughout her lifetime. It depicted how she loved her father and loved him through thick and thin, despite everything that he did because in the end he was and will always be her dad.