The Perfect Storm Rhetorical Analysis

Words: 760
Pages: 4

Charles Oxyer
Ms. Nieves
AP Lang
8 August 2016
Rhetorical Strategies in The Perfect Storm The vast seas of the Atlantic can be an unknown, treacherous place, and most people do not understand the dangerous conditions that are out at sea. In The Perfect Storm by Sebastian Junger, Junger perfectly captivates the devastating events that occur in the ocean. The author masterfully uses a combination of ethos, logos, and pathos to captivate his intended audience’s attention. His primary audience is anyone looking for a thrilling, factual account of a tragic event in history. Junger provides his credentials as a journalist and states that everything in the book is completely factual, proving his credibility to the audience. He cites his research and interviews that he had done on other sailors in order to show the purpose of the text through logic and reason, and he writes about the tragic romance that occurs between the main character Bobby and his wife, Chris, proving to the audience how dire this event truly was.
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In the beginning of the novel, Junger reveals his credentials as a journalist and says that everything in the novel is factual, showing the purpose of the text is to inform readers that are interested in nonfiction of a tragic event that occurred in history. Junger states, “I wanted to write a completely factual book…no dialogue was made up…I’ve written as complete an account as possible of something that can never be fully known” (Junger 4). This shows that Junger wanted the reader to know that he had written a credible novel and that the purpose was to write a thrilling, completely factual account of history. The author masterfully uses ethos in The Perfect Storm to prove to the audience that the purpose of the novel is to give an honest account of the tragic disappearance of the Andrea