Essay Database

The essay that I am summarizing today deals with the issue of self-respect and the search for self-respect. At the beginning of the essay Didion describes a situation that she experienced at the age of nineteen. The experience deals with the failure to be pledged to a college honor society. The author realizes that life is judged on merit and not who you are. Didion begins to understand that all situations have consequences. The author …

…without these things. The author describes a situation called alienation from self. This is when a person has no self-respect and cannot stand to do anything because of the fear of rejection. She describes how a person cannot risk this fear because they have no confidence in themselves. The author says a person must have self-respect because without it a person will go and try to find him or herself and find no one exists.