The Metal Box

Author's Note: This is a point of view essay about the book The Maze Runner by. James Dashner. I will be explaining about  who's point of view this book is told from and how it sucks in the reader.

Imagine waking up in a scorching metal box having burning eyes watching your every move. Well that’s how the main character Thomas, from The Maze Runner by James Dashner felt, and I felt it just as he did because he was the narrator and the story was told from his point of view.  In the book The Maze Runner the main character Thomas, wakes up in a metal box in the year 2024 with the memory of his past life wiped. He is welcomed into a large, concrete area called the Glade, populated by a group of sixty or so teenage boys called "Gladers". The Glade is surrounded by massive concrete walls, beyond which lie an enormous maze. All Gladers have arrived the same way as Thomas: one every month with memories wiped. In the Maze Runner Thomas is the one telling the story and it is all told from his point of view.

One way that Thomas’s point of view influences how the reader feels and reacts to the story is pulling them into the story. By making them feel like they’re actually Thomas, going through fear, death ,and sorrow living inside a somewhat pit of despair. His point of view really influences me, because the fact that he is living his life in a “Jail cell” he still lives life to the fullest enjoying every bit of happiness that he has left. It influences me by making me feel what he does, like how he feels cocky and superior to everyone around him, it almost makes me feel as though I am as superior, and cocky as him.

However the reader would feel a lot differently about Thomas If this story was told in the point of view of his best friend Chuck. For instance , Chuck is a young ditzy boy around 13 years old and  doesn’t know much about growing up. I think the reader wouldn’t react too well to Thomas’s attitude toward him, because though Thomas is older and wiser ,Chuck somehow seems not as interesting to Thomas or the reader. Within the story they get into a lot of fights all because of Thomas taking advantage of Chuck, getting him into trouble, and calling him names. Although Thomas seems to be a cocky, stuck up kid he tries very hard to be a good friend to Chuck.

In The Maze Runner The narrator Thomas gives the reader a clear perspective on how it’s like to live life everyday in the Glade. From having his best, and only friend Chuck  taken away from him to falling in love with the only girl in Glade Teresa. He learns to deal with the loss of what was before, from all the way back to that opening of the metal box.

The Revolutionary war was impacted on many citizens from England to America. Especially for the children of these areas, there is a lot to take in when you’re father leaves for war and your mother becomes deathly ill. In the book Give Me Liberty Thirteen-year-old Nathaniel Dunn is an indentured servant laboring on a tobacco plantation in colonial Virginia. Life is hard, and it’s about to get harder when Nathaniel is sold. At an auction, he is separated from his one friend, a teenage slave named Moses. 

The movie The Patriot, and the book Give Me Liberty  are very much fiction but has many situations that are true. There are also many situations that happen within the book and the movie that are very similar. I will be writing a compare and contrast on the specific situations for the movie and the book.

A similarity that the book and the movie have is that is that both children-children’s parent’s were in wars. In the movie the dad Benjamin Martin served in the French war. As in the book before Nathaniel’s father died he served in the The Battle of Yorktown. Another similarity/compare is how both Nathaniel and the seven children Benjamin had are all without a mom to take care of them while their father is in war.

Some differences that the book and the movie have is that in the movie has to do more with ending the war for everybody letting everyone have peace. And the book has to do with children being free because there is child slavery in this book. Another Difference is how the movie and the book are in different times in the book it takes place in 1770 and the movie took place in 1764.

Is Your Innocence Lost?

Author's Note: This is an essay stating the theme of the book Speak I will compare this book to another book that has a similar theme as Speak.

 

 

When ever someone insults you, hurts you, and brings pain to you physically and mentally do you let it slide and walk away, continually having to deal with the loss of happiness. Or do you fight back with all the build up sorrow, and fatigue that specific person, or people have caused you to have. Making them most likely to back off and leave you alone. Leaving you the better person. This leads to our theme of the book, loss of innocence. 

Melinda the main character from the novel Speak struggles with her loss of innocence. She was taken advantage of at a party. Where an upperclassman violates her. This ends up causing pain and destruction to her own self all because she stood up for herself and called the cops against her attacker, making  her seem very vulnerable to everyone around her. Many others in real life deal with this problem, which leads to bullying. For Melinda bullying is very active in her life, bully's constantly push her buttons with inappropriate nicknames, abuse, and being teased about her physical appearance. Bullying is dwelt with everywhere especially in Junior Highs, and High school it is a problem that usually can't be stopped but can be treated. 

A novel that has a very similar theme is the book A Child Called "It" by. Dave Pelzer the theme is very similar to Speak's because in the two books the main characters each have to deal with bullying, and losing there confidence. Which makes it hard for them to stand up to anyone. The author of this terrific story Dave Is writing a book about his horrific childhood in the 1970's  being bullied for his unwashed clothes and his smelly body odor, and having to deal as a young child being violently abused physically, and mentally by his sick and twisted mother.

 Everyone will deal with loss of innocence sometime in there life, just some may not be as bad as in this book, Loss of Innocence is dealt by everyone who goes  through difficulties in life, dealing from bullying at school to an  abusiveness family member death of a mother or father. You just have to take care of it the right way. Talking to a teacher a friend someone who you believe in and that someone who believes in you. Never just brushing it off your shoulder, deal with the situation. No matter how hard or bad its best to tell someone that can help.