Question

Read the excerpt from Silent Spring. The roadsides, once so attractive, were now lined with browned and withered vegetation as though swept by fire.

In this excerpt, which phrase best shows the author’s tone of despair?
a)"so attractive"
b)"now lined with"
c)"withered vegetation"
d)"as though swept"

Answer 1

C because it's really really sad

Answer 2

In the excerpt, the phrase which best shows the author’s tone of despair is the following one:

c)"withered vegetation"

It is an image of pure sadness, since it conveys the idea of something that was once full of life and now is dry, withered, resembling a corpse at an advanced state of decomposition. The author, Rachel Carson, uses such description to express her inner desperation, the putrefaction of her own soul.