Total Eclipse, She Describes Different

¶ … Total Eclipse," she describes different things in order to help shape our experience in the journey that she take us on. Early on in the essay, she describes a clown painting hanging in her hotel room as well as a bird in a cage that is in the hotel's lobby. Later in the essay, she notes a young man's Hasselblad and the way he describes what appeared to him to be a Life Saver up in the sky. This paper will look at some of the people, things, and objects that Dillard uses in her story and attempt to find meaning in their seeming randomness.

In the beginning of Dillard's essay, she describes a painting of clown that is comprised of painted vegetables. While this sounds quite silly (and Dillard seems awe-struck by the fact that she is even giving it any consideration), Dillard goes further to say that she thought that the clown's eyes has the gaze of Rembrandt. She states, "The clown's glance was like the glance of Rembrandt in some of the self-portraits: lively, knowing, deep, and loving" (Dillard 3). Dillard seems to be adding something meaningful to this otherwise pointless painting by noticing something that is unique about it. She is able to see past its garishness and value something in it. Perhaps Dillard is saying that we could all do to spend a bit of time really looking at something rather than just passing it off with a quick gaze. It is something that Dillard never thought she would look at or care about, but it is something that she cannot forget once she does.

Dillard also discusses the men in the hot mines of South Africa, India, and South Dakota. She states that the "gold mines extend so deeply into the earth's crust that they are hot" (Dillard 5). She describes air conditioners having to be installed because of the heat and if it wasn't for them, the miners would die. She also notes how slowly the elevators run in the shafts so that the miners' ears will not pop as they are going up and down. Why does Dillard describe these men? It is almost like Dillard is trying to tell the reader about how fragile life is. The lives of these men are depending on one air conditioner. It is a machine that could turn off -- just quit working at any time -- and that would be the end. The elevator ride up seems important because the men come out with ghostly pale faces -- like they know that they have cheated death once again.

There is something about the Life Saver as well at the end of the essay that makes one think of death or loss. It is like Dillard is finding hope though. She says, "I grabbed that life saver and rode it to the surface. And I had to laugh. I had been dumbstruck on the Euphrates River, I have been dead and gone and grieving, all over the sight of something which, if you could claw your up to that level, you would grant looked very much like a Life Saver" (Dillard 13). Perhaps there is something about her going to some kind of depth. This experience of seeing the total eclipse brought her to a place where she feels that she needs a life saver in order to get back to reality.