Aron Ralston, an ordinary 27 year old man from Marion, Ohio was trekking through Utah in April 2003 where he encountered a near death experience. Ralston’s story is a worldwide phenomenon as his story has now been published in to a book and a movie called 127 hours with James Franco.
Aron Ralston once quoted in his book, Between a Rock and a Hard place. “There are a million things we survive every day without recognizing we were ever at risk. Then we have a close call, and we become acutely aware of what that fraction of an inch or that split second means.”
Aron Ralston’s story has been published in thousands of articles but an article written by Mark Jenkins called Between a Rock and the Hardest Place, really does a good description of Ralston’s near death experience. Whether it is descriptive language or direct quotations to give the reader a somewhat visual description of his arm getting caught in the boulder. Whether it is his plans or mentality, it mixes information with direct quotations to back up what the story is stating, thus making the story seem so much more real and descriptive. This somewhat engages the reader as the story isn’t just plain knowledge as the reader is able to understand what Ralston was actually feeling and his emotions and that his mentality is one to look up to as Ralston did not give up. For example, after the boulder crushed his hand, Ralston explained at the press conference, “I very quickly figured out some of my options. I began laying plans for what I was going to do.”
The use of objective language helps to factually describe the ordeal as an upfront encounter but it also appeals to emotive language with the use of quotes of his current mentality and his feelings at the current time. This appeals to the reader, as the reader is able to get a factual recount of Ralston’s 5 day experience as well as a stand-point from Ralston’s personal recount. The story doesn’t wonder on Ralston’s feelings as it is very factual regarding his background and his past Skiing incident in Colorado. In some way this registers the reader. Being objective makes the story seem like what it actually was instead of a mediocre report of a guy getting his hand stuck in a ravine, drawing the reader to read this particular report instead of a news report because it enables the reader to feel the actual experience and all the other factors which may not have been explained in a short news report.
The use of tense in the article engages the reader by directly speaking to the reader and informing them of what Ralston actually experienced. The use of third person narration and first person personal comments make engage the reader by being more descriptive as they information to back up what they are saying Ralston was feeling at the current time. Hence why they do this as It doesn’t leave the article stale and keeps the pace going thus the way Mark Jenkins did this was very intelligent to keep the reader coming back for more.