The assignment for this essay was to pick a figure from a work that we had recently read in class and explain the importance of that figure, creating our own argument and analysis in context of the historical significance of the literary work. I chose the figure of fire from The Kingdom of this World by Alejo Carpentier, and I analyze how fire related to the Haitian Revolution.
I chose this as my best piece from my First-Year Seminar class because I found the prompt interesting and enjoyed the unique approach of analyzing the novel from the perspective of a figure. Since we clarified in class that figures are different from symbols and motifs, the structure of this essay was purposefully loosely defined to maximize creativity and interpretations of powerful moments in the novel.