Ariel Levy's "Thanksgiving in Mongolia": A Reflection
This reflection paper analyzes Ariel Levy's personal essay "Thanksgiving in Mongolia," in which Levy recounts a reporting trip to Mongolia that ends in the tragic premature loss of her pregnancy. The paper examines the essay's central themes: finding joy amid suffering, owning the consequences of one's choices, and the profound emotional weight of motherhood — however brief. The writer also connects Levy's narrative to their own personal experience as a mother, exploring how the essay resonates on an emotional and philosophical level, and what lessons it offers about gratitude, responsibility, and cherishing fleeting moments of happiness.
- Overview of Levy's Narrative: Plot summary of Levy's Mongolia essay and miscarriage
- Themes of Joy, Responsibility, and Gratitude: Analysis of key thematic messages in the essay
- Motherhood and Emotional Attachment: Levy's portrayal of brief but powerful maternal bond
- Personal Reflection and Connection: Writer's personal response as a mother of three
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What makes this paper effective
- The writer moves naturally from plot summary to thematic analysis to personal application, creating a logical three-part arc that keeps the reader oriented.
- The personal connection in the final paragraph is candid and grounded, adding emotional authenticity without overwhelming the analytical content.
- The paper identifies specific, distinct themes — gratitude, personal responsibility, and motherhood — rather than treating the essay as a single undifferentiated "sad story."
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates thematic analysis supported by textual evidence: each theme is anchored to a specific moment or quotation from Levy's essay (e.g., the closing line about being "somebody's mother"), showing the student can move between general claim and specific textual support.
Structure breakdown
The paper is organized in four sections. The first summarizes the narrative arc of Levy's essay. The second unpacks three distinct themes — finding joy in adversity, owning one's choices, and appreciating small pleasures. The third focuses specifically on the theme of motherhood and Levy's emotional response to her loss. The fourth is a personal reflection connecting the essay to the writer's own life as a mother of three. This structure mirrors a standard response-to-literature format appropriate for an undergraduate English course.
Overview of Levy's Narrative
Ariel Levy opens her essay by reminiscing about other trips and journeys she had taken around the world. The bliss of those adventures — the notes she kept, the details she gathered — formed the emotional foundation of her writing life. She comes across as someone who loves to celebrate and appreciate even the smallest things. She then turns to the main event of the essay: her trip to Mongolia during Thanksgiving. It began well, with a good arrival, warm reception, and the promising start of her coverage of mining and the Mongolian economy.
However, things soon changed. She began experiencing physical discomforts stemming from her pregnant condition, and these ultimately led to a miscarriage. She did not want to accept that the fetus could not survive, and she held on — but at nineteen weeks, survival was not possible. Their time together was short, yet deeply meaningful. Writing from the present, she describes the experience as simultaneously the happiest and the saddest moment she ever had in Mongolia. Levy's essay, originally published in The New Yorker, became one of the most widely read and emotionally resonant personal essays of its era.
Themes of Joy, Responsibility, and Gratitude
Several important themes and ideas run throughout the essay. Notably, Levy does not recount expensive or luxurious places she visited in wealthy nations. Instead, she focuses on trips to remote, impoverished parts of the developing world — places where simply documenting the lives and livelihoods of the people she met felt like enough. Through these experiences, she communicates to the reader that comfort and joy can be found in almost any situation.
From the simple games of childhood to the slums and wilderness she explored, and finally to the Mongolia experience that ended in miscarriage, the narrator consistently finds something worth smiling about. The essay also reflects honestly on personal responsibility and the consequences of one's choices. Although the doctors in Mongolia were reluctant to attribute the miscarriage directly to the travel, Levy herself believes that choosing to make the journey at that stage of pregnancy — even after warning symptoms had appeared — was the decisive factor. She does not shy away from this conclusion. In doing so, she models personal responsibility and encourages readers to have the courage to own the outcomes of their decisions.
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