Declan Schweitzer

Reading Journal Dec. 3^rd.

Trial by fire is a narrative profile piece that has many qualities that remind me of the piece we read about infants dying in cars. Though it is not a trend piece like the infant-car story, the stakes of the story are pretty high and it is an intense read. The intensity of the language in these types of stories is what I feel makes them different from news pieces which by comparison would gloss over the gritty details and horrific accounts in favor of facts and evidence.

The story does not start out with the feeling that Willingham was the cause of the fire it simply gives the background information, which deals a lot with the protocol of any case involving a fire. It seems from the first paragraphs that Willingham acted, as any father would have, hysterically. It also describes in detail the scene of the fire which it done through important details that are not necessarily objective but work well in the sense that they convey the reality of the situation. For example “Flames spread along the walls, bursting through doorways, blistering paint and tiles and furniture. Smoke pressed against the ceiling, then banked downward, seeping into each room and through crevices in the windows, staining the morning sky.” It is doubtful that the first sentence of this quote is something that anyone is able to give an account of. And even if they were the language used intensifies the situation—it brings it right to your mind’s doorstep. Anything that “stains the morning sky” is intense and that is exactly the point of that phrase. I feel that in a news story such language would not be appropriate because it would be too subjectively motivated.

As you continue to read the idea seems to be that you are looking into the twisted fate of a man who killed his children and has no remorse. However, as we begin the second part of the story it is unclear what perspective in being taken on Willingham. From the start we see a different side of Willingham as his letters to Gilbert are quoted. He seems to be “an honest” mans whose time in the pen has made him question himself and his life. This new feeling about he character gives a new light to his fervent unwillingness to plead guilty. The quotes from the character himself are framed in a very different light than those in the first section, which is why they have a different implication. In the beginning the quotes used show nothing more than a guilty man’s aim at displacing blame or playing dumb. In the later half there is new sense of this man because of his apparent honesty. One detail that sticks out is his refusal of vending machine snacks because “I didn’t want you (Gilbert) to feel I was there just for something like that.”

The important part of this piece for me was that it was a very compelling account of this story, which did not seem to leave anything unsaid. What it did not do was give grand opinionated statements about the event but instead gave a good all around perspective that showed more insight than is possible in a news story. Ultimately I think that this is arguably more real than a hard news version of the story. It seems to hold more truth.