The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: Independent Post

          I am currently reading The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon, and am really enjoying it.  It is about a boy named Christopher John Francis Boone.  Christopher has some type of disability, making his life quite hard already.  On top of that, he has plenty of trouble at home.  
          In my opinion, Christopher's disability pretty much causes all of his problems.  The author never tells us what exactly he has, although I would assume it is autism, as he is more socially disabled than mentally.  He is incredibly smart, especially in math, but he cannot relate to people at all.  The blurb says that he "knows all the countries of the world and their capitals and ever prime number up to 7,057."  He also will scream if even his own parents try to touch him in any way, and relates many times better to dogs than humans. 
          The hardest thing happening in the text is probably his inability to relate to anyone.  Because of this, he often does not perceive events how they were in reality.  He likes having fixed definitions and formulas for everything that will always work in any possible case.  For example, when someone lies to him, even if it is to protect him, he only sees it as lying is bad, and he shuts that person out of his life as much as possible.  He does not really have the ability to add in any other factors that will change from situation to situation.  I don't agree with everything the person that lied to Christopher did, but unlike Christopher, I can see that part of the reason the person did this was to protect him.  He cannot hug his parents, they have developed another way to show that they love him that involves less contact, but in his teens he is already probably better at math than they ever were or will be.  I think that Christopher's way of relating to people, caused by his condition is the hardest thing in the text for everyone around him, and himself although he does not see it.  It really alienates him from everybody else.  I wonder if he knows just how different he is, and how?
          In the book, you almost only see Christopher's point of view.  He is not able to read the emotions of others, aside from things as basic to whether or not they are happy, mad, or sad.  Because of this, you do not really get to go too deeply into the thoughts of anyone in the book aside from Christopher.  I like this, because the author does a great job of portraying what it would be like to have Christopher's condition, and I think this is very interesting.  He does not understand how others feel, but I don't think he understands his own emotions very well either.  I think the author might leave the opinions of others out because without them, you really get a sense of Christopher's world, and what life is like on a daily basis for him. 
          For justice, I do not really think that Christopher's condition is unjust, but it is unfair.  Nobody inflicted it on him, it just happened, but he did not do anything to deserve something like that just happening.  I think it might be slightly unjust that his parents cannot get their act together and give him a good childhood.  They did not do anything to deserve a child this difficult to care for though, so I guess in is not really unjust, but again unfair for Christopher.  Although, it is also unfair for his parents; their lives would be a lot easier if he did not have this condition.  I don't know if justice will ever be served.  I doubt that his parents will solve their problems, and if he is autistic, you cannot really cure that, only treat it. 
          I think I mostly resist the text when I know something that Christopher does not.  When something is happening to Christopher, and he sees it differently than how it is.  I just wish so badly for him that he could understand everyone else.  Or that he could have someone who truly understood him.  I think this is because I picture how much better his life would be in many situations if he was without his disorder.  Once I picture it like that, I hate that everything is so difficult for him, because of the one thing he did not really deserve.  I also resist when I can tell what is going to happen, and that it is going to hurt him.  I almost don't want to actually see it happen, but I keep reading.  Sort of like I sympathize with Christopher.  
           I feel bad that this one thing defines his entire life so much and it always will.  His condition does not have any positive sides, it only hurts him, and he did not deserve it in any way.  At one point, he talks about a happy dream he often has.  In this dream everyone on earth has died aside from the people with his disorder.  He makes his parents die in the dream, but keeps all the people like him, even though he has never met them.  He says that one reason he keeps them is because they are the only quiet people who would not bother him.  In a way, it would not really matter if they were alive or dead in his dream land because he would never have any interactions with them at all.  But to me, and probably deep down to Christopher, it makes all the difference that he keeps them.  I wonder if he feels at all connected to them, or relates to them?  Or he feels that they are the only people that he really feels comfortable around and not intimidated by?  In my opinion, this is one of the few points in the book where you clearly see Christopher's feelings on an important topic. 

A Wind in The Door: Social Action Critical Thinking Questions

     Because I read A Wrinkle In Time during the whole rereading thing, I was inspired recently to read other books in the series, and by Madeliene L'Engle in general.  This led me to read the second book in the series, A Wind in The Door.  This book pretty much starts off where the first book leaves off.  Yet it has a completely different antagonist, and plot in general. 
     Social Action Critical Thinking Question # 3:  How does the text make you think about justice in the world? 
      In A Wind in The Door, justice is not really served where I am in the book.  I read the whole series a while ago, so I do not really remember if justice is ever served, although I figure it probably is eventually, as it is in so many childrens books.  So far, Meg's beloved little brother Charles Wallace has just started school.  He is far smarter than his peers, and possibly than his teachers.  Obviously, this really alienates him among the the other kids of his small elementary school, and from the first day, to Meg's disappointment, he becomes a huge target of bullying.  Mr. Jenkins is the stupid, non active principal of the elementary school.  When he sees how badly Charles Wallace is being beat up everyday, he does nothing.  Even after Meg goes and personally talks to him, he does nothing.  This definitely is not justice being served, when sweet, smart, small Charles Wallace, is being beaten up. 
     What makes this even more unjust, is that this problem would be fairly easy to solve.  It should not be to hard for Mr. Jenkins, to end the bullying of Charles Wallace.  And it is not like Charles Wallace is some stupid little kid who deserves no help.  He is probably the smartest kid in their school.  He kind of deserves it. 
     Meg brings and represents justice.  She is definitely who I would assume. She is incredibly close to Charles Wallace, and would defend him at any time, she would even risk her life for him.  Meg and Charles Wallace's mother also tries to help him.  Of course, she is his mother, so her representing justice in his name is quite expected.
      Mr Jenkins blocks justice, and I really do not see his motivation.  It would not be hard to help Charles Wallace at least a little bit.  It would also improve the reputation of his school, and Meg would still dislike him, but would stop repeatedly asking him to help Charles Wallace.  He does not really have a motivation, but I think what is stopping justice, is Mr. Jenkins lazy-ness.  That's pretty lame. 
     In the real world, there would be many, many situations like this.  Whether or not justice would be served would depend on how lazy, or mean the people around you were.  This would be Mr. Jenkins in the book.  Although Mr. Jenkins is bad, Charles Wallace does have his very determined and stubborn sister; Meg.  And Meg is putting as much effort into serving justice for Charles Wallace as she can. 
     To answer a small part of Social Action Critical Thinking Question # 2, I think we mostly see Meg's point of view in the books.  I think Charles Wallace's perspective is not shown, because he is just too smart.  We would know everything that was going to happen, fifty pages before the event actually occurred. 
     In conclusion, justice has not been served, but I really hope it will be eventually, and that Charles Wallace will be okay in school and possibly start making some friends. 

Sarah's Key: Social Action Critical Thinking Questions

     In the book Sarah's Key, by Tatiana De Rosnay, the main character and protagonist Julia Jarmond is going through a sort of mid-life crisis.  She lives in Paris and has for the past twenty-five years, yet her French husband's family still won't except her, partially because she is American.  Her French husband, Bertrand, has been cheating on her for a while, and really is not treating her that well overall.  When she becomes pregnant with the child they had been hoping for for many years, he says he does not want it, and ends up divorcing her because she refuses to have an abortion.  After the divorce, she goes home to America, which she had been missing for some time now, and lives in New York City with her oldest child Zoë, and the recently born Sarah.  Although all this seems sad, she ends up happier after the whole thing, her husband was bad anyway, and she has another child.      

     The cause for all this in Julia's life, starts out with an assignment she gets from her job as a reporter in Paris.  That year is the sixtieth anniversary of the Vel' d'Hiv Roundup in Paris.  That was when many, many thousands of Jews in Paris were arrested, and eventually exterminated in concentration camps, during the Holocaust.  It's code name was "Operation Spring Breeze," and the purpose was to reduce the Jewish population in France.  Julia starts to research the topic and becomes incredibly engrossed in it.  She ends up finding out about a young Jewish girl named Sarah who lived in the apartment her husband's family had lived in, and that she was about to move into with her husband.  It turns out that Sarah had actually lived there with her family, until they had been taken in the roundup.  That was when Bertrand's family was able to move in.  When they moved in, something terrible happened that only Bertrand's father and grandfather, and grandmother knew about.  It was always regarded as a huge family secret, so it was pretty serious when Julia started investigating.  Most of Bertrand's family was very unhappy about it, but in the end, when they all found out about the horrible thing that had happened, I think it helped them.  Throughout the book, both Julia and Sarah's story is being told, and their lives become kind of intertwined.  

      Regarding the first social action critical thinking question, the Holocaust is of course a very hard thing that is happening while you are in the part of the book that Sarah is narrating.  I think that being unable to accept others' differences and racism are both underlying parts and causes of the Holocaust.  During Julia's part of the book, which is most of it, I think her her just growing apart from her husband is important and hard.  I also think that she is growing apart from him, because she never really loved everything about him.  He is very charming, determined, exciting, sometimes fun, and hansom, but also of ignorant, annoying, and just plain mean quite often.  His family has also never accepted her or even come close, and he has not tried to stick up for her once.  He also practically makes fun of her for being an American.  She finds that when she once liked his teasing her, it's getting pretty old now.  Bertrand is also changing.  He has lost most of his good qualities, and actually is not really what he seems.  

     For the second question, you see from the point of view of French people who want to cover up the whole roundup, and mostly from people who have accepted it because they know that it would be wrong for it to be forgotten.  Julia and Sarah both have the later mentioned perspective, but I think Sarahs point of view as someone who is going through the concentration camps is especially interesting.  It shows you how betrayed and scared the people must have felt when the same French police who were supposed to protect them, were now escorting them into the camps.  For example, in a camp, Sarah sees a policeman who only about a month or less ago, was helping her cross the street on her way to school everyday, is now working in a camp.  I also noticed that the author never shows the perspective of someone who is pro-Holocaust.  Even the people who try to cover up the roundup up and say that it is all in the past are not pro-Nazi. 

     In conclusion, there are some very hard things going on, and some interesting points of view in Sarah's Key, and I think that for both Julia and Sarah, it is a loss of innocence story.  Julia realizes that she is not too happy with her life, and her husband was never really as good as he seemed.  She always deserved better in my opinion.  For Sarah, her whole family and everyone she knows is killed, after being arrested by the police of their own country.  This all happens within a very short period of time at a young age.  Obviously, this makes her grow up way too fast, realize how terrible the world can be, and it kind of ruins the rest of her life. 

Night: An Appreciation

     Night, by Elie Wiesel is a practically biographical account of a young Jewish boy's account of the Holocaust.  In the beginning of the book, Eliezer, the main character is removed from society along the the other Jewish people in his community, and put into an enclosed ghetto.  They live there for a while slowly experiencing more and more restrictions on Jews.  Eventually, they start removing the people from the ghetto, and on trains that will take them to Auschwitz, and Eliezer and his father end up at Buchenwald after that.  Throughout this journey Eliezer completely changes and loses everything, including his family.  

     One aspect of Night that I thought was interesting was how Eliezer loses all faith in his once cherished religion during his time at the concentration camps.  When the book starts, Eliezer is completely interested in learning about and studying his religion.  Every night, he intently reads and dissects the meaning of pages of religious texts for hours sometimes.  When he sees the concentration camps, he is at first hopeful that god will help them.  After he has been there for long enough he starts wondering how god, who to him, could control everything, could let this happen, and why god, who, in his opinion, had created everything, would create something so horrible for them to suffer in.  He wondered if it was a punishment, but they had not done anything wrong.  Others around him said it was a test of their faith, and that they had to stay strong.  But why would a test be so terrible?  One Rosh Hashanah, Everyone else at the camp is praying, and talking; the people are brought together by the holiday, it is something they all have in common.  But Eliezer just does not believe in god anymore because of what he has been through.  One of the most faithful had stopped believing, thinking that if there was a god, he could not do something this terrible.  That was how bad the concentration camp experience was, he gave up in one of the most important parts of his life. 

     I also thought it was sad how the horrific experiences people endured caused them to separate even from their family member's, and it became an everyone for themselves type of situation.  The book described a boy killing his father for a scrap of bread, or someone purposefully leaving their father behind on a "death march," only because his dad would slow him down, the father actually ended up surviving.  But of course, the people kind of had to think only for themselves.  To a certain extent though, it definitely does not justify killing your father for a little piece of bread.  There was almost no food, and they were all living in awful conditions.  Being generous, doing things like giving food to people who at the time needed it more than they did, would have eventually killed them.  

     Overall , I loved the book Night.  It was an incredible account of the monstrous things that really went on inside of concentration camps like Auschwitz or Buchenwald, and how they forever changed people.  

The Poisonwood Bible: Appreciation, and Analysis of the Setting's Importance

     Today, I finished The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver.  It takes place from 1959 to about 1986 when a family, the Prices, move to the Belgian Congo.  Nathan Price, the father of Rachel, Adah, Leah, and Ruth May, and wife of Orleanna, is a passionate preacher, and goes to the Congo as a missionary.  The story is told in the eyes of the four daughters and their mother Orleanna.  The Congo ends up being different than what any of them expected, and it significantly changes them all.  

     Every member of their family goes on the trip thinking that they have set out to change the Congo.  They refuse to do anything in the Congo's way, thinking that their American ways must always be better, especially Nathan.  He does this even when planting seeds in his attempted garden.  But most importantly for Nathan, he is convinced, no matter what, that Christianity is best and that they should all convert.  He can totally think this himself, but trying to force it upon others for so many years when they have so clearly said no, doesn't really make sense.  In a way, Nathan is the only one in the family who doesn't change.  Down to his last days, he is convinced that his ways are best in everything.  


     Leah, one of the daughters, changes quite a lot.  In the beginning of the book, she followed her father in everything and completely looked up to him, even when he was entirely ignorant to this fact.  She was one of the few people who, for a while, believed it when Nathan did things like always pretend to know more than everyone in the room, even if he new nothing.  As she started to grow up, she doubted her father more and more, and started standing up to him.  She realized that he was often wrong.  Almost like in A Wrinkle in Time, when Meg realizes her father isn't perfect.  Of course its very different because Meg's realizing that although not perfect, her father is still a great guy and she still loves him.  Leah is realizing that her father is very far from perfect, and really is not good.  Leah also becomes very involved with Africa, in a way, it becomes her home, even after other members of her family have gone.  She marries someone their, and becomes involved with helping the Congo.  I think this is almost because she feels bad for what the Americans did.  When claiming to help the Congo, and bringing democracy, they were also bringing down the Congo's new democracy to get a better hold on the valuable deposits of diamonds and rubber the land of the Congo held.  


     Adah, Leah's twin also changes a lot.  She goes in thinking of herself as left behind, abandoned, and she is kind of a dark person in general, although she is very, very smart.  She is always sitting alone, and rarely talks.  When she and Adah were born, she developed some kind of problem that led to the left half of her body to be sort of dysfunctional.  She got used to thinking of herself in that sad way, of Leah abandoning her, and stayed like that.  She was used to it.  Going to the Congo changed her, when she came back to America, she was more talkative, and she discovered that the limp on her left side from birth, had been in her head for many years.  


     Rachel, the oldest child, was not so much changed by Africa, but I think it really hurt her.  She remained selfish, and sort of vain, the whole time, but going to Africa robbed them all of having a normal childhood and that hurt Rachel the most.  Back in Georgia, she was popular, pretty, and lived for sleepovers, talking about boys, and hanging out with her friends.  She had been planning for her sweet sixteen for practically her entire life.  In Africa, she left her family in the small town they were staying in, to go to the city because she found it more civilized.  Although she got to a place she liked, she had many bad marriages, and It took her a long, long time to find something she liked to do, and to do it.  


     Orleanna, the mother of the girls, was changed by Africa for good and bad.  Her youngest, most beloved child Ruth May died there, but it also got her to separate from her terrible husband.  I admire how she finally said no to Nathan, and did what she thought was right, and left with her kids.  I think she did it for them.  


     Africa changes them all in major ways, good and bad, and one thing I liked about the book was seeing how they all ended up going back to, giving back to, or at least having some part of their lives involved with Africa. 

A Wrinkle in Time: Guided Reading Questions (Question # 5)

     When Mrs. Whatsit first told Meg that she needed her anger, I didn't really understand what she was saying.  Now, I think Mrs. Whatsit was saying that if used for the right cause, anger can occasionally be a good emotion.  Meg's anger towards "It" for taking her father, trying to destroy her planet, and hypnotizing her brother Charles Wallace is very strong.  

     

     When Meg faces "It," that anger helps her stay strong, and she uses her anger as a positive emotion.  For example, Meg uses her anger on page 178, to help her stay strong against "It".  She says that she thought, "that is only she had a dissecting knife she would slash at It, cutting ruthlessly through cerebrum, cerebellum."  On page 159, Meg directly says that her anger helped her overcome "her pain and fear."  

     In the case of Meg versus "It," Meg's anger, (although sometimes very destructive and violent as shown in the quote from page 178,) is a positive emotion, but obviously, anger can be very, very negative.  Anger can be used to motivate people and make them work hard for a cause they believe in.  Anger can also be used in a catastrophic, damaging, and brutal way.  Osama bin Laden would be an example of someone who lets their anger out using those methods.  

     In A Wrinkle in Time, Meg uses her anger in a good and motivating way, and although her anger helps her very much, I think that love is an even more powerful emotion, and more important in the book.  Love is the emotion that Meg ends up using in the very end of the book to save Charles Wallace and defeat "It," the antagonist. 

Archetypes in A Wrinkle in Time

       In Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time, Meg Murry, Charles Wallace Murry, and Calvin O'Keefe go on a quest to find and rescue Meg and Calvin's father, and kill "It."  They travel through time to different planets with three creatures, Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Which.  

       The Hero: Meg Murry is definitely the hero of the story.  She is the one who is most determined in trying to find her father on the strange planet of Camazots, and who is most changed by the journey.  While this makes the story a Task/Quest, it is also kind of a Loss of Innocence.  Throughout the book, Meg is maturing and learning about herself. 

       The Mentors of A Wrinkle in Time are Mrs.Whatsit, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Which.  They are the ones who take them on the journey in the first place, they also take them to planet of Camazots, and give them as much knowledge as they can.  All three are very wise (especially Mrs. Which,) and have a lot of experience fighting "It".  For example, Mrs. Whatsit sacrificed her life as a star in the name of fighting "It," or the "Black Thing," making her the youngest of the three.  

       The Shadow of A Wrinkle in Time is definitely "It."  You don't directly meet "It" until further into the book, but "It" is there from the beginning.  "It" has the power to control or hypnotize, and then speak through people.  On the planet of Camazots, "It" has taken control of just about everyone there, and also possesses Meg and Charles Wallace's father.  As a result of "It" taking control of them, almost everyone on Camazots does the exact same thing at the exact same time.  For example, when Meg, Calvin, and Charles Wallace first arrived on Camazots, they walked down a street.  Every boy on the street was bouncing a ball that landed on the ground at the exact same time.  When they knocked on the door of one of the houses, every door on the block opened and a lady stuck her head out of each one.  Earlier they saw one of the boys with a ball drop his, and it rolled away on the ground.  Later, they saw the boy in Camazots's CENTRAL Central Intelligence Building, sort of being reprogrammed by "It."  The people are not robots-they can make mistakes, and they don't all look the same-they are just under "It"'s control.  "It" opposes Meg by keeping her from her father.  
       The Shapeshifter: So far, I'm not sure who the Shapeshifter is (if there even is one,) and I don't remember from when I originally read the book.  
        Before this, I had only thought of there being a main character, a character who opposes the main character, and the rest were just secondary characters.  Now, I have realized that almost all of the important characters play a very specific role in a book.