English: The Power to Change Lives

 And yet another novel I’m reading ends but I'm still mourning the death of the character. That's who I am when it comes to fiction, no matter a novel or a blockbuster. I get so caught up in the life of the characters that I forget for a tiny moment what reality is. I celebrate characters' achievements as if they were my own and their deaths like they were part of my life. My friends thinks I get too involved in the fiction characters' life more than my own, and it is true. But that is only because I see the beauty in writing, whether it is a novel, a screenplay or a drama script.

Writers have the ability of a higher power. They can choose what happens in the plot, which characters they want to destroy, or where the plot should be set.  They have the world in their hands when they start writing, whether they know it or not. That is the kind of power one can only dream of in reality. What draws me to fiction is the power to change lives of audience just by cleverly putting down words and scenarios. The tricky part is to make sense of everything that is going on at the same time making it appealing.

Writing itself is a masterpiece because of how language is used. For example an excerpt from an author Jodi Picoult. “People say you can't believe in a ghost, because you can't see it or touch it or capture it. By that criteria, though, those people have to say that love doesn't exist, either… and yet most of us have experienced that in some form or another.” How many people can think of those two subjects being compared in such a way that they now have a similarity? How we use language to describe or to narrate a story does make a difference in creating a work of art.

I would like to be a writer someday or at least something in the field involving the English language. I enjoy making up scenes and telling them to an audience. I love reading. And I am fascinated with literature. Literature in English was a difficult course in high school and it took a while for me to understand the depth literature brings. Now however, I see literature daily, and sometimes I tend to over-analyze things. I have so many ideas I’d like to express with language and art. In order to do that as a profession, I need to major in the English field.

I would like to take up the major of English Studies. I believe this could help me gain an all-rounded understanding about the English language. I would be able to learn about English in the corporate and professional stream and English in the creative stream. This would allow me to broaden my horizons and not just focus on creative writing but also on other aspects the English language serves.

The English language is the most extensively used language internationally. It can open doors to many opportunities whether it is learning or working. English Studies will enhance my knowledge on different aspects such as literature. Having studied Literature in English during my high school years, I find it quite useful in understanding lessons in life. Literature has enriched my social and cultural knowledge because of centuries of writers and critics trying to explore a deeper meaning within some simple English text.

I want to major in English Studies because English is a beautiful language. It is more than just words strung together to form a comprehendible sentence. Like everything and everyone, the English language has a history, and I want to know learn about it. Whether it is learning from a novel, a philosopher, a movie, a drama script or even a piece of poetry. If there is a message, I want to learn about it. Exploring the English language can lead me to my dream job. One day, it would be someone else sobbing over the ending of a novel I wrote.