Andre Gide

Today's post is about a man named Andre Gide. He was born in 1869. The biography of him does not give much information on his life. It says as a child he was severly prone to getting sick, and at some point he became gravely ill and nearly killed him. Because of his prone to sickness, it interupted his education for long periods of time. Though he grew up to be an author writing books like, Le Retour de L'U.R.S.S, which was about his trip to Russia. He also wrote an autobiography in his lifetime. Lastly, he died on February 19th, 1951.
The quote I have from Mr. Gide is, "What thwarts us and demands of us the greatest effort is also what can teach us most." This is an interesting quote. He is explaining that what has high demands and constantly eats at us can teach us alot, so I personally would see this talking about a father figure or someone you look up to of some kind. I don't think I completely agree with this quote because, I know my parents are not perfect. My mother especially...but even though they try to teach somethings to you, sometimes it is not always the right thing to do, for example, if your dad told you to jump off a bridge would you do it? Gide was born and raised in a very different time than what we live in now. Back then, you listened to your parents otherwise they'd beat you. Now it's them telling you what to do and hope you listen in fear of hitting because of a lawsuit. That's just the way it is, and personally I at an early age could see through some of the faults of my parents and knew they were not always right, so I created my own expectations of things I would and would not do, and so far I've done pretty good in life.
The word for today is, benign: Not harmful; gentle.