Blog Six in the Mix

A) The verse book I have chosen to read is Monster. My initial thoughts are that there are a ton of characters that I can not seem to keep track of, and the layout of it is sometimes hard to follow, which keeps me from being able to easily read this novel. The fact that it is laid out in a movie script kind of way makes it cool to be able to really invision the scene but at the same time I feel as if I have no real connection with any of the characters, even the main character Steve. The script has no emotion or tone of voice to it so the reader must create it on their own. Then, from the script part, to the narrations where it says, “Close up on this person,” or, “Moving shot of blah blah blah,” it is so distracting to me, so I have tried to skim over those parts and focus mainly on what people are saying. Then again, after that it may transition into Steve’s journaling or a flashback to Steve’s past before being locked up in jail, which I do enjoy, but I still do not feel connected to him. I also think I feel a little disconnected to him and the book itself because I just read Wonder for our last book club, and I was so invested in the book and the main character Auggie, and Monster is just so totally different. In addition, as compared to the other books in this book club, I do not see how this is poetry; I never thought of script as poetry. With that said, I am still focusing on getting more into this book even though I am more than halfway through, and I want to find out what happens and I am pushing through to complete it whether I do end up enjoying it or not. It is something different than I have ever read before, and because of that, I am interested. In addition, I am not sure if or how I would teach this book in my future classroom, but I definitely would like to incorporate poetry. I do not remember learning about or creating poetry during my elementary school years, but I did during high school. In my freshman year English class, we created our own poetry books with poems we liked, and then some of our own too and got to decorate it however we wanted. I remember thinking it was hard but it was not as bad as I thought because we had inspiration from other poems we were reading, and were allowed to follow the same format. In my later high school years I remember learning a lot about Shakespeare and had to act out parts and all of that jazz and I remember hating it and never being able to follow along because we had to interpret so much. Interpreting was the hardest thing for me and that turned me off from pursuing reading or creating any more. Sometimes I do not think that we have to interpret every little thing and instead should read for the purpose of enjoyment, and that is what I have found from out class, which I want to make important for my future students.

B) Cento: Movie Fantasies

You didn’t say before that we had to tell why.

I thought you’re supposed to be innocent until proven guilty.

I just want to do the right thing, you know like a good citizen.

I just desperately wish this was only a movie.