Kira Nikolaides
Mrs. Parkinson
English III
8 April 2016
On Dumpster Diving
In “On Dumpster Diving,” Lars Eighner uses pathos to make us feel sympathetic for him because of his situation. When talking about how he first began Dumpster diving, he says, “While Lizbeth and I were still living in the shack on Avenue B as my savings ran out, I put almost all my sporadic income into rent. The necessities of daily life I began to extract from Dumpsters” (713). This description makes us realize just what a horrible situation he is in. He says that his saving are running out and how he has to put any money he has towards rent, which makes us feel bad for him. He barely had anything and he had to put everything he had towards keeping his shack. Our sympathy for him goes even further when he says he had to get all of his other needs from Dumpsters. Most of us can’t even imagine being in a situation like that -- we haven’t had to get the things we need, like food and clothes, from the trash. Eighner lays this out for us and through his use of pathos, we are able to feel his pain, despite not going through this ourselves. We can picture him putting all the money he has towards rent and having to figure out where to get food. We can picture him looking through a Dumpster to find the things he needs. This image makes us feel bad for him, as we could never imagine ourselves in that situation.
