The intended audiences for both stories are different as well. In “To Fall in Love…” the audience is targeted towards people who are young adults and are wondering how do you know you're in love, while “Joyas Voladoras” intended audience is pointed towards the more "scientific" and educational audience.
The purpose of each story is also very different. In “To Fall in Love With Anyone” the purpose was what it meant to know someone and to be known and loved. At the end Mandy writes "Love didn’t happen to us. We’re in love because we each made the choice to be." The purpose was to show that people can't choose who loves who and that it is the little things that count, even if that means asking each other thirty-six silly questions and a four minute stare to prove to yourself you love them. “Joyas Voladoras” purpose was to show how humans aren’t fully open with anyone, because their hearts can contain so much information that not one person can completely understand or know someone because of that.
To start I would contrast the two authors’ attitude about the subject. Doyle comes across very cynical to me, while Catron pushes the idea of hope. I would also add that Doyle and Catron have very different ideas about the ability for humans to connect with each other. Doyle seems to be of the mindset that we are never connected with anyone. He says that we are never completely open with anyone and that we open windows but are forever trapped in our own hearts. On the contrary, Catron stresses how easy it is to connect and even fall in love. She says that all we need to do is try to get to know someone. Lastly, I would say that the audiences for both differ as well. Doyle seems to target learned writers while Catron targets the general population of people looking for companionship and/or love.
ReplyDeleteI really agree with all the points you make. In Brian Doyle’s essay “Joyas Voladoras”, his stance is very matter of fact and scientific. He goes on the explain the different sizes of hearts, specifically the hummingbirds, the blue whales, and the humans. He ties it all in by giving the idea that no matter the size of the heart, they are all vulnerable and open to hurt. It simply a choice of how open you want to be. His example of every living creature having a set number of heart beats and if you want to live them fast or slow is basically asking the question of if you want to be open enough to the idea of love regardless of the hurt. On the other hand, Mandy Len Catron’s article from the New Yorker “To Fall in Love With Anyone, Do This”, she comes across much more personable and, as we learn at the end, retrospectively. She goes into detail about a study done to create love. An acquaintance and her try the test out and end up successfully creating the feelings of love. From here she, like Doyle, says that despite certain things being natural, you can chose love as long as both parties are making the choice to be open to it. Both article kind of touch on the same ideas even though the audiences might not be exactly the same with one being a reading in a text book and the other in magazine read for entertainment, albeit higher thinking entertainment.
ReplyDeleteI agree with both you and the commentators, but I do not think Doyle comes across as cynical. I think he comes across as any old man would-- suspicious, careful, and calculating. He is 81 years old, therefore he has a lot more experience in the world, and probably with love, than Catron does. Catron appears to me as the same as the audience she's appealing to. A giddy, young hopeless romantic. So, obviously, as two different people, they appeal to different audiences-- Those who calculate every step and those who step into something hoping for the best. But, in the end I think both essays are similar in meaning which is that everyone is unsure about love. In Catron's article, people reading do not know if they are in love and desire to see if their love is true, whereas in Doyle's story, he reminds us that no matter the size of the heart, we are all open to vulnerability. So, in the end, after reading both stories, love is a mystery that is personalized with each person. Each person has to make up their own mind about what love is.
ReplyDeleteJoyas Voladoras by Brian Doyle is a lyric essay in which he mainly focuses on the scientific facts of the many hearts held by different humans, animals, amphibians and so on. To Fall in Love with Anyone, Do This by Mandy Len Catron is a first person point-of-view and guide of how two people who have known each other and decide to mimic a scientific experiment in which two strangers fall in love. The intended audience for Doyle’s lyric essay would be an older audience who have experienced love and many other various emotions throughout their lives. Catron’s account of her experience is aimed for an audience of young adults who are now venturing into the world looking to settle down with someone. I believe that both authors had a purpose in mind of teaching their audience about love and how we can love others. In Doyle’s essay, he writes about how different creatures in the earth have about “two billion heartbeats to spend in a lifetime” (pg 504). He focuses more in giving information about how our anatomy works and how a younger person views love compared to an older person who knows you can’t just assume someone will come a sweep you off your feet. Catron’s purpose was also to show that love isn’t just waiting around for someone to come sweep you off your feet as well, however she also taught and gave a guide that we must go out there and be vulnerable for a little to find the right one. If we fall in love, it is because of our own doing.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I read and how I perceived the two readings, I would have to disagree with your blog post, but just on Catron’s essay. Catron emphasized the fact that you can choose to love someone willingly, and if they do so as well, you two could fall in love. It seems as if she had wanted to prove love could be controlled. Considering the experiment she decided to try, the outcome was that love could very well be controlled. At the end of her essay “Modern Love” from The New York Times, she wrote “Love didn’t happen to us. We’re in love because we each made the choice to be” which in my opinion, proves the control we have against the feelings of love or falling in love. They could have easily disagreed to running the experiment or attempting the idea of ‘falling in love.’ Either one could even fall out of love and throw off the expected results of the experiment. Doyle’s essay “Joyas Voladoras” in my opinion, emphasized the fact that one’s heart cannot determine ‘love.’ It is too busy beating for a more purposeful reason, for example, keeping us alive, rather than looking for one to be ‘in love’ with. I do agree with your view on his essay. It does seem much more cynical than Catron’s explanation of the idea of falling in ‘real’ love.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your point that the two styles of writing differ from each other completely. In "Joyas Voladora", Doyle uses metaphors to describe basically every aspect of what he believes love is. He goes to say, "No living being is without interior liquid motion. We all churn inside" (503). By this I believe he is saying we all have a beating heart that is capable of feeling emotion. Where as in the article "To Fall In Love With Anyone, Do This" Cantron tells us her own personal story relating to an experiment done to make people fall in love. While this is a personal story she refers back to the experiment throughout, and uses much less figurative language to describe her experience. I don't agree though the the audience is different, I actually think the audience for both is the same. Both the article and the essay talk about falling in love, which could be targeted at anyone honestly, and what happens when one reaches that point of love, the essay "Joyus Voladoras" gave more of an explanation on the way it feels to be there, rather than how to "get there".
ReplyDeleteIt's true that they both come across very differently describing love. But seeing as one is a 81 year old man and the other is a much younger women I'm not surprised. Doyle is a bit more somber than Catron but I think its caise he is explaining the bigger pocture and not a fond memory. Catron mentions how love is an action, constant and conscious. Doyle almost in contrast describes how everyone is vilnerable no matter what walls we put up. But both stories are correct, to love is a conscious act but even against our will our heart will feel.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your statements regarding the purpose, writing styles, and intended audience. In Joyas Voladoras, Doyle uses a lot more figurative language in his writing, opposed to Catron’s writing To Fall in Love With Anyone, Do This. Doyle’s use of figurative language is one of the prime ways that his writing style differs from Catron. The intended audience can already be inferred that Doyle’s writing is meant for much more intellectual people, because of the heavy use of scientific facts. When it comes to Catron’s writing, her approach is more to the common public, who have interests in knowing how to love. Both writings are similar but very different in their own ways.
ReplyDeleteIn both stories, the authors are both talking about their different views of love. In the New York Times “To Fall In Love With Anyone, Do This” the author shares her personal, firsthand experience about how love for herself was found through a scientific approach. The intended audience seems to be foe people interested on the question of Science and love or young adults wondering about love. In the other story, “Joyas Volladares” the author talks about love in a more distant, serious manner to get the point across. The intended audience can be for people who are interested in learning about the “non-fairytale” view of love.
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