Monday, May 14, 2012

Double Point of View

Author's Note: I was assigned to write about how the point of view affects the story, and how the story would change if it had been written from another characters point of view.

In Secret Soldier, a historic fiction novel, the story is told from Deborah Sampson's point of view. Deborah explains what life is like putting on britches and entering a world where men dominate. She pretends to be one of them, terrified of being caught. She sees them all as evil masters, creating a world where women are scarcely needed and poorly treated. Further into the story, she befriends a man named Roger. After attempting to bathe with Deborah he figures out her secret. Deborah makes constant efforts to share her story and begs Roger not to report her, but he shies away and refuses to talk to her. Deborah begins to dwell on memories and eventually falls in love with Roger. However, if the story was told from Roger's point of view, the book entirely would not contain the word "love" at all. He sees a demanding stalker with a passion for his trust. Sure, he saw her without britches--or any clothes at all-- but it means nothing to him. Her personal business belongs to her, he should have nothing to do with it. The tale of Deborah Sampson is true, and her accurate views throughout the book prove it. Unfortunately, Roger's opinions were unheard. As interesting of a story they both may have, he died at war without ear caring for his side of the story.

Harrison Bergeron



I sit on the couch as I am supposed to after work. You see, this is the only rest time we receive, besides sleeping time. Today was a long one.
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George came home! Oh how I hate being lonely. Lonely, lonely me..
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George is too tired to go out tonight, so we'll sit at home and watch the television. Oh how I wish he could take those weights off.
"You been so tired lately,"
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"You're kind of wore out," I said. "If there was just some way we could make a little hole in the bottom of the bag, and just take out a few of them lead balls. Just a few."
"Two years in prison and two thousand dollars fine for every ball I took out," he told me. "I don't call that a bargain."
"If you could just take a few out when you came home from work," I said. "I mean-you don't compete with anybody around here. You just sit around."
Im strongly against his formal acts around me. He's no competition to me!
"If I tried to get away with it," he said, "then other people'd get away with it-and pretty soon we'd be right back to the dark ages again, with everybody competing against everybody else. You wouldn't like that, would you?"
"I'd hate it," I thought out loud.
"There you are, the minute people start cheating on laws, what do you think happens to society?"
A few minutes passed.
"Reckon it'd fall all apart," I replied.
"What would?" he said blankly.
"Society," I was getting confused now. "Wasn't that what you just said?
"Who knows?" said George.
Poor George. I'm glad I don't have a handicap. I must be perfect.
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Oh! The dancers are so pretty on TV, I wish to be one someday.
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A boy came on the screen, he looks familiar. Harrison! My son, whatever happened to him. I can't remember why he left us. I feel tears running down my face.
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George walked in with a beer. "You been crying" he said.
"Yup," I replied.
He asked what I'd been crying about.
I had forgotten.
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"Something real sad on television."
"What was it?" he said.
"It's all kind of mixed up in my mind," I said.
"Forget sad things,"
"I always do,"
"That's my girl," said George. His face shriveled in pain. The handicap did that to him sometimes.
"Gee - I could tell that one was a doozy," I told him.
"You can say that again,"
"Gee-", "I could tell that one was a doozy."
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Tuesday, May 8, 2012


Other People's  Business

Author's Note: This is my prediction piece to I The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon.  Included is a scene I have written that I believe would fit well into the book's resolution.   

After walking outside to greet his friend (the neighbors dog) Wellington,  Christopher was spotted stroking dead Wellington's bloody head.  Mrs. Shears, Wellington's owner called the police and screamed repeatedly at Christopher, who is autistic and didn't enjoy this.  After being released from jail, Christopher makes it his goal to figure out who did kill Wellington and why.

 I believe that Mrs. Shears killed her own dog.  I think this because the main characters shows evidence that her shock after finding out that her dog had died, couldn't have been because of surprise.  Also, when Christopher went to investigate who did kill the dog, Mrs. Shears was not open to talk about it, yet she didn't feel sad.   If Mrs. Shears did not kill her dog, because she is not showing proper emotions,  I am positive she knows who did.  The books mode of literature from my perspective so far is a comedy. 

I walked into the shed of Mrs. Shears, father had told me not to 8 times in the past week and I had been relying on white lies to keep me out of trouble.  It was very spacious in here. I did not like spacious, it reminded me of a show I watched with Mother once; the man walked into a spacious room with all the lights off, and martial arts fighters jumped out from all directions.  I knew this wasn't going to happen here, the worst thing that could happen would be that Mrs. Shears would find me and call the police again. I would not like this.  While looking around and dreaming about the possible uses of all the machinery in here, I spotted the fork.  The fork that was used to kill Wellington was in Mrs. Shears shed.  I ran to the police.  I had solved the crime, Mother would have been so proud.