rough draft 2nd essay

The effects of 9/11 on American literature is interesting to me.  The inability of authors to capture the moment or feeling or event in some definitive way is missing.  Why is it so hard to write about the event in a way that captures the feeling of the country? In this class we have read some poetry and short stories but there is no one author that has been able to write the one novel that  really strikes a cord with all readers.  John Updike's, Varieties of  Religious Experience, gives the reader a glimpse of different perspectives of the tragedy through the eyes of a religious view.  I think is looking for God to answer the question of why.  Is there a God? Is it possible to have such a senseless tragedy if God does in fact exist?  Is everyone's view of God so different that it can somehow justify the tragic events? Is it a collective, cultural religion which we stand under and is our shelter in times of national tragedy- the candles and flags that Updike mentions? Or is 9/11 a senseless tragedy which cannot be defined or pinned down?