TeacherScribe

It is about time for the end of the semester. I am getting tired of them. Isn’t that horrible? Yes and no. I think some of my students are getting tired of me too. It is time for a change. Though I have to admit I am really enjoying the two novels we are reading, Night and Fahrenheit 451.

My goal for my next Junior English class is to read more novels. I almost plunged into The Jungle, but I opted to do Fahrenheit 451 instead. Maybe we will just read sections of The Jungle. I know that too sounds horrible. How can you read sections of a book? Maybe I’ll give them the option of reading the entire thing if they want. But I have no illusions. I can’t guarentee that students aren’t just reading sections of Night and Fahrenheit 451.

A colleague gives students the option to choose which novel to read. I just don’t know if I could make that work. I like the idea that we all can discuss (well, attempt to discuss) what we are reading at any given time. Plus, let’s face it, I’m totally random abstract. I can hardly keep track of one novel. How could I keep track of five?

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We just read this scene in Night --

[A Dutch overseer of a unit has been smuggling weapons and, supposedly, attempted sabotaged the central electric plant powering the death camp. He had a young boy who was his assistant. Several others were implicated too. It is the boy’s death that shakes Wiesel’s faith.]

“Then came the march past the victims. The two men were no longer alive. Their tongues were hanging out, swollen and bluish. But the third rope was still moving: the child, too light, was still breathing . . .

And so he remained for more than half an hour, lingering between life and death, writhing before our eyes. And we were forced to look at him at close range. He was still alive when I passed him. His tongue was still red, his eyes not yet extinguished.

Behind me, I heard the same man asking:

‘For God’s sake, where is God?’

And from within me, I heard a voice answer:

‘Where He is? This is where -- hanging here from this gallows . . . ‘

That night, the soup tasted of corpses.”

That was a powerful scene. You could have heard a pin drop in here.