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In great literature, no scene of violence exists for its own sake. Either from your own reading or from the list below, choose a work of fiction in which the reader is confronted with a scene or scenes of violence.
Then, in a well-written essay, analyze how the scene or scenes contribute(s) to an interpretation of the work as a whole. Do not merely summarize the plot.
Author Study: Literary FRQ #1
In the novel, Speak, Laurie Halse Anderson employs Melinda’s feelings after being raped by a senior in high school, and her eventual overcoming of the feelings she has when faced with her rapist again in order to display how Melinda is able to cope and heal from the scenes of violence she has been faced with, ultimately illustrating that coping with hard situations is crucial in moving forward.
Melinda deals with very poignant feelings after she is raped right before she becomes a freshman in high school, which makes it hard for her to move forward. To illustrate, before her freshman year of high school, Melinda goes to a high school party during the summer. There, she meets Andy Evans, a senior who she at first finds attractive. He takes Melinda out to the woods and rapes her where no one can hear her scream. Everyone hates Melinda when they start school because she called the cops and the summer party was ruined because of that. The rejection Melinda is faced with turns into Melinda feeling extremely alone and isolated during her freshman year of high school. Because Melinda called the cops because she was raped, she was trying to be strong and get through her situation, but instead her doing so led to everyone hating her in school, even though they never found out what truly happened to her and why she called the cops in the first place. Consequently, this scene of violence leads to really depressing feelings of isolation and loneliness, which makes it hard for Melinda to cope when she is surrounded by hatred. Therefore, Melinda’s struggles with coping in her hard situation shows that scenes of violence can make it extremely hard to move forward, which is why it’s necessary to cope in tough situations. Meanwhile, Melinda being lonely in school causes her to push everyone away, except for her art teacher. For instance, after she loses her best friend due to Melinda “being too depressing” for her liking, Melinda feels like she has no one she can turn to. Her art teacher sees what is happening and continues to encourage Melinda to keep pushing forward and to draw out the emotions that she’s feeling and put them on the page. Melinda starts to draw trees, which is the drawing she has been assigned to practice all year and see how her drawings revolutionize. Although the drawing of her tree in this instance is really dark, it still allowed her to process her emotions of isolation, sourced from Andy raping her. Because her art teacher pushed her to really feel her emotions and utilize them in a healthy way, it showed Melinda that he does care about her and that she is not alone. Since she uses this coping mechanism he presented to her, she truly starts to understand the guilt, loneliness, and fear she is feeling from being in this scene of violence. Thus, Melinda utilizes drawing as a way to cope and move forward, overall showing that if she hadn’t taken the time to cope and move forward, she would have stayed stagnant in her feelings, and possibly only have gotten worse.
As the novel starts to reach the end, Melinda is faced with a scene of violence once again. However, this time around she knows how to properly deal with her emotions. As Melinda tries to cope, Andy Evans starts to tease and mess with her as she goes through her freshman year. For example, Andy Evans would constantly stalk Melinda while they were in school, and he would call her things such as “freshmeat” and other horrific things. This taunting leads Melinda to cut herself because she feels that she has no other way to escape the situation she is currently in. She feels forced to hide the scars on her arms in fear that people will call her an attention seeker for cutting herself. Meanwhile, Andy continues to have this vice grip on Melinda that she can’t shake. Because Melinda felt alone, she ended up hurting herself in order to cope with the emotions she is feeling. Consequently, her poignant emotions of hurting herself leads to her not taking the time to truly traverse through her emotions and try to figure out why she is feeling the way she is. Therefore, Andy constantly taunting her and Melinda cutting herself, both show that if Melinda had truly thought about her emotions, that she would be able to move forward and truly cope. A month after Melinda cutting herself occurs, Andy tries to rape her again, but this time she knows what to do. To demonstrate, Melinda had turned a janitorial closet at school into her own little hang out spot. One day, Andy Evans corners Melinda in the closet and attempts to rape her again. As Andy attempts to overpower her, she realizes that she doesn’t deserve to be raped and she punches him in the jaw. After she leaves the closet and her used-to-be friends see what had happened, they realize that Melinda wasn’t being isolated to be an attention seeker, and they praise her for punching Andy in the face. Because Melinda coped and healed due to her processing her emotions in that moment, she was able to gain control over her situation. Since Melinda was able to triumph during this scene of violence, it allowed her to move forward in her life, knowing that she won’t allow Andy to have that kind of control ever again. Thus healing and moving forward was crucial during this scene of violence, since she channeled all of her inner emotions, and realized that she doesn’t deserve to be treated like her body doesn’t matter.
Overall, these scenes of violence that take place throughout the novel led to Melinda suffering, but since she was able to cope, she could move forward and not allow the violence to hold her in place. Melinda was faced with many trials during her freshman year of high school, but the novel showed how her emotions evolved from hiding in fear of Andy, to triumphing over him and taking control of her own situation. The only way she was able to be successful by the end of the novel was because she coped with the scenes of violence she was faced with and didn’t allow the situations to stop her from moving forward.
Author Study: Literary FRQ #2
It has often been said that what we value can be determined only by what we sacrifice. Consider how this statement applies to a character from a novel or play.
Select a character that has deliberately sacrificed, surrendered, or forfeited something in a way that highlights that character’s values. Then write a well-organized essay in which you analyze how the particular sacrifice illuminates the character’s values and provides a deeper understanding of the meaning of the work as a whole.
Author Study: Literary FRQ #2
In the novel “The Impossible Knife of Memory”, Laurie Halse Anderson employs instances of making tough decisions and battling difficult emotions in order to convey Haley’s experience of taking care of her dad, Andy, who has PTSD from fighting in the war, ultimately illustrating people will sacrifice something in order to keep what they value.
Throughout Haley’s teenage life, she has to make hard decisions when it comes to taking care of her father. For instance, Haley meets Finn when she starts her senior year of high school. When they start to develop feelings for each other, Haley finds the situation difficult, since she feels she can’t bring Finn around her dad, due to the unpredictability of his actions. There is a time when Finn drops Haley off and her dad attempts to attack Finn while he is blackout drunk. Haley had to decide whether she should take care of Finn’s feelings or take care of her dad who was extremely drunk. She ultimately forces Finn to leave and takes care of her dad. Because she chose to take care of her drunken father, it shows their relationship and that Haley values her family. Consequently, this incident led to Haley having to choose between her boyfriend and her father, which is ultimately a tough decision. Therefore, Haley sacrificing Finn’s feelings exemplifies that people will sacrifice people at times in order to keep what they value. As the drunkenness of her father progresses throughout the novel, Haley has to make another hard choice between listening to Finn and saving her father. Haley’s father leaves behind many signs that he plans on killing himself: such as cleaning up his act and leaving behind goodbye letters to Haley and his military friends. Her father goes out to a park near their home and attempts to jump into the river off of a very high cliff. Haley slowly inches towards the edge to save her father and Finn is constantly trying to tell her to back off of the edge so she doesn’t fall. Haley’s father also insists that she goes back, but instead she grabs him off of the cliff and returns him to safety. After she saves her father, they have a poignant moment and apologizes to Finn for not listening. Haley chose not to listen to Finn and instead attempted to save her father because she values her dad and she didn’t want him to die. Since she is put in this predicament, she has to choose whether to possibly sacrifice herself and die, or listen to Finn and her father commit suicide. Thus Haley had to make a very tough decision which ended up saving his life. This illustrates that people will make a sacrifice if it means holding on to what they value.
While tough decisions exemplify what Haley values in the novel, she also has to battle through the harsh emotions of abuse from her father. Haley has to make sacrifices as she battles with dynamic thoughts and chooses what is ultimately the best option for her. Specifically, Haley’s father catches her texting Finn while Haley and her dad are sitting together in the backyard. Her father gets really mad that she’s texting a boy and he throws her phone into the fire they had set up. This leads to Haley yelling at her dad and he takes her by the collar of her shirt and almost punches her, but he calms down. Haley goes inside after this altercation and thinks about if she should let her father treat her like this or not. Because Haley thinks highly of her father, she suffers with really upsetting emotions after he almost punches her in the face. Consequently, these emotions highlight her true care for her father and that she doesn’t want to upset him, which shows that she values her father’s opinion. Therefore, she sacrifices correcting her father’s behavior and instead doesn't try to get in his way again, which shows that she is willing to sacrifice putting her father in his place since she values his opinion on what she does. Another instance where Haley battles with stark emotions is when she finds her dad almost dead in their living room. Haley comes home from hanging out with Finn to her dad almost dead on the ground. The entire house is demolished by her father, breaking all of the dishes they own, tearing the couch apart, and setting part of the house on fire. He is found on the ground with blunt force trauma to the head and she has to rush him to the hospital. After she gets home and her dad is still in the hospital, she cleans the house as best as she can as she deals with the persistent thought process of should she tell his military friends about this incident. She ultimately chooses to tell his friends about the incident so they can all attempt to get her father the help that he needs. Haley’s dynamic thoughts lead to having a conversation with her father’s military buddies because she cares so much about her father. Since she decided to get her father help, it signifies the love and compassion that she carries for her father and that she cares about both his physical and emotional wellbeing. Thus although she is scared of the consequences that could arise from her decision, she sacrifices the safety of not taking the leap of faith and decides to get her father help in the end since she values her father being alive.
In conclusion, Haley’s love for her father, even with all of his PTSD problems, is exemplified many different times throughout the story. Also, Haley’s decisions show that she is willing to sacrifice certain choices since she values everything about her father. If Haley didn’t care so much about her father and both his physical and emotional wellbeing, she wouldn’t have made the sacrifices she did to keep her father alive. Haley is a great example to show that people will sacrifice things, if it means that they get to hold onto what they value.
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