Lee Miller - The Siege of St. Malo Response

I found Lee Miller’s article, “The Siege of St. Malo” to be rather interesting. Miller included so much detail that I was able to envision the scenes in my mind as I read along. She gives of short snippets of the scene around her as she lists off the flower pots in roomless windows, the chimneys putting out smoke from the houses that burn around it, a cat howling itself to death, etc. It was almost as if she was giving us photographs to see in our minds instead of a photograph that we can actually look at. I really enjoyed that aspect of her writing. Another part I thought was interesting was when she compared her current surroundings to her last memory of them. For example the patio in front of the hotel once being covered with tables and umbrellas now being covered in barbed wire. It was all so interesting for me to visualize and it really gave me a feeling and sense of the atmosphere. Everything she wrote was so easy to visualize for me and I really liked that. The man that had reached the top of the hill only to be shot and fall over, she said he was waving to death – this was another part that caught my eye. I just really enjoyed the sense of atmosphere that this essay gave me.