Outside Reading #5 - Epitaph for the Race of Man

Epitaph for the Race of Man is a series of sonnets written by Edna St. Vincent Millay. She provides adequate information to let readers know her exact thoughts with the relationship between human beings and Earth.  The first few sonnets are dedicated to honing in on the destruction of mankind and how they will be wiped away from this world (Edna, 2016).  This crazy phenomenon where meteor showers could destroy the Earth is possible, but actually just the process of human beings eroding away from their own kind is also inevitable if there is no change in the way humans live.  In the very first sonnet, Edna writes “Before this cooling planet shall be cold... Earth will have come upon a stiller day, Man and his engines be no longer here” (Millay, 1981) which refers to how mankind will eventually die off along with the actual Earth.  However, the first to die will be humankind before the actual Earth is destroyed.  Edna Millay’s foretelling of what could happen to the planet she lives on in the future follows her beliefs in life of freethinking and allow her to make these assumptions based on what she has learned in her life.