"The Face of a Spider"

Paper Summary:

This paper analyzes David Quammen's essay "The Face of a Spider," in which he discusses arriving in his office one day to see it covered by baby black widow spiders. The paper reflects on Quammen's actions and thoughts as they are described in his essay. It then discusses the questions of how a human should behave toward the members of other living species.

From the Paper:

"The narrator in the story arrives at his office and finds it full of spiders, and he is able to turn such an odd occurrence into something which gives him a greater reflection towards the world. He knew the mother spider was there, yet he ignored the problem and thus was forced to face black widows in his office. Now he is reflecting on that even from a few years ago, saying that, "To me, they stand for something" (Quammen). He even goes as far as to say what they stand for and that is a question he poses but he cannot answer. However, because of the experience with the spiders he is now enlightened. This state of enlightenment is expressed not only through his actions and direct language, but also through the way he speaks about other culture's dealings with living species. He is not critical, but open minded when mentioning the Janist culture for example. It is all part of a reflection on the events of the past, and therefore David Quammen has taken a simple event with little meaning and applied so much more to it."

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