Introduction:
I love literature. I always have and always will. I would be lying if I said I spend the majority of my spare time reading, but I do a fair bit of it. Last year's literature course was right up my alley and I managed to ace the entire course. I couldn't wait to start the next literature course as I am planning to do as much with literature as I can. I read that for the coursework, I need to read a book a week (not a problem) and I need to maintain a blog with a post every week showcasing my understanding of the book I've read.
I love literature. I always have and always will. I would be lying if I said I spend the majority of my spare time reading, but I do a fair bit of it. Last year's literature course was right up my alley and I managed to ace the entire course. I couldn't wait to start the next literature course as I am planning to do as much with literature as I can. I read that for the coursework, I need to read a book a week (not a problem) and I need to maintain a blog with a post every week showcasing my understanding of the book I've read.
First thoughts/impressions:
For this week, I picked Alice in Wonderland as it was the only one I hadn't read yet. It's always quite exciting to see if a new book can pull you into the story, especially one that has such a big fan base. I had seen the movie adaptation of the book called "Alice" (starring Johnny Depp and directed by Tim Burton) so I was quite excited to see if the movie actually holds up to the book. My initial impression was very positive. It doesn't pull any punches and drops you straight into the story instead of dragging on explaining the characters and their significance. I love stories that do that because they force you to use your brain and figure out the characters and their motivations by yourself instead of holding you by the hand. I also love the puzzles and little brain teasers that Alice is presented with, like the mathematical puzzles. As I point out in the interesting theory section, the writer didn't start out as a writer but as a mathematician, which is fantastic and really shows throughout the book.
The book starts off with Alice and her sister being introduced as characters (her sister being a very minor one). It suddenly starts to pick up when she spots the rabbit with the pocketwatch and tries to catch up with him causing her to fall into a massive rabbithole. This is where all the crazy things start happening. There are all kinds of weird things about the world she ends up in and she goes on both a mental and physical journey to try and find a way out of this world. She meets all kinds of characters including the White Rabbit, the Cheshire Cat, The Caterpillar and many many more. It is a fantastic journey which ends with her waking up questioning whether everything she experienced was just a dream.
Age suitability/Theory:
"Young adult literature should have an intriguing character, a meaningful plot, a captivating setting, an appropriate theme and an accessible style". (complete reader, 2013, p. 21).
If we go by these requirements Donald Maas provided us with I would definitely recommend this book to my students (HAVO 3) and children that are even younger. It is a great book and would provide the students with a more complex vocabulary as Carroll tends to write in a different style from most writers including poems in his stories that would probably confuse the students with lower English understanding capability. The nclusion of pictures to accompany the story should even the playing field a bit. Furthermore, surreal books like this challenge us and the children to do the work of creating meaning in ways that “realistic” narratives do not (Tatar, 2009). The book isn't written in old English (at least not the version I read) and I feel children aged 10+ should be able to read this depending on their level of English. They can definitely relate to the emotional journey she takes through Wonderland and all the different creatures she meets. The Hatter and the Cheshire Cat are usually favourites, as they are very dynamic and interesting characters that have multiple layers to them. The world of wonderland can provide many of aspects a children's book should have as we discussed in class. It has an intriguing protagonist, a captivating setting (let's be honest, Wonderland is incredible) and the theme is very relatable.
In class discussion:
The class discussion was quite interesting. We were discussing about what draws children to read books and we also talked about every book that was available to read this week. We were discussing the common links between all the books that were on the list for this week and one of the main thing was the absent parents.Yet as soon as Disney was introduced as a topic of conversation it all exploded into chaos. Several people argued that there are no parents in any of the Disney movies, some said that there were, but they were dead. Another interwoven theme was the concept of growing up. All the books we discussed (Alice, Peter Pan, etc) had the concept of growing up or the resistance to growing up. Overall the class was great, as I was quite interested in hearing what other people thought of this book and to see if there were overarching themes about these 4 books that were on the list. Let's see what next week brings us.
Interesting theories/information:
This is one of those books where there is an endless source of speculation and theorization about the symbolism and secrets that this book could have. For instance, did you know what the author, Lewis Carroll, wasn't a professional writer but a mathematician? This could explain the abundance of puzzles involving maths in this book. Another interesting thing in this book is the use of riddles. ‘Lewis Carroll’ is a pen-name and a riddle in itself. Charles Lutwidge Dodgson took his first and middle names, translated them into their Latin form ‘Carolus Lodovicus’ reversed the words and then translated them back into English(QI website).
For this week, I picked Alice in Wonderland as it was the only one I hadn't read yet. It's always quite exciting to see if a new book can pull you into the story, especially one that has such a big fan base. I had seen the movie adaptation of the book called "Alice" (starring Johnny Depp and directed by Tim Burton) so I was quite excited to see if the movie actually holds up to the book. My initial impression was very positive. It doesn't pull any punches and drops you straight into the story instead of dragging on explaining the characters and their significance. I love stories that do that because they force you to use your brain and figure out the characters and their motivations by yourself instead of holding you by the hand. I also love the puzzles and little brain teasers that Alice is presented with, like the mathematical puzzles. As I point out in the interesting theory section, the writer didn't start out as a writer but as a mathematician, which is fantastic and really shows throughout the book.
The book starts off with Alice and her sister being introduced as characters (her sister being a very minor one). It suddenly starts to pick up when she spots the rabbit with the pocketwatch and tries to catch up with him causing her to fall into a massive rabbithole. This is where all the crazy things start happening. There are all kinds of weird things about the world she ends up in and she goes on both a mental and physical journey to try and find a way out of this world. She meets all kinds of characters including the White Rabbit, the Cheshire Cat, The Caterpillar and many many more. It is a fantastic journey which ends with her waking up questioning whether everything she experienced was just a dream.
Age suitability/Theory:
"Young adult literature should have an intriguing character, a meaningful plot, a captivating setting, an appropriate theme and an accessible style". (complete reader, 2013, p. 21).
If we go by these requirements Donald Maas provided us with I would definitely recommend this book to my students (HAVO 3) and children that are even younger. It is a great book and would provide the students with a more complex vocabulary as Carroll tends to write in a different style from most writers including poems in his stories that would probably confuse the students with lower English understanding capability. The nclusion of pictures to accompany the story should even the playing field a bit. Furthermore, surreal books like this challenge us and the children to do the work of creating meaning in ways that “realistic” narratives do not (Tatar, 2009). The book isn't written in old English (at least not the version I read) and I feel children aged 10+ should be able to read this depending on their level of English. They can definitely relate to the emotional journey she takes through Wonderland and all the different creatures she meets. The Hatter and the Cheshire Cat are usually favourites, as they are very dynamic and interesting characters that have multiple layers to them. The world of wonderland can provide many of aspects a children's book should have as we discussed in class. It has an intriguing protagonist, a captivating setting (let's be honest, Wonderland is incredible) and the theme is very relatable.
In class discussion:
The class discussion was quite interesting. We were discussing about what draws children to read books and we also talked about every book that was available to read this week. We were discussing the common links between all the books that were on the list for this week and one of the main thing was the absent parents.Yet as soon as Disney was introduced as a topic of conversation it all exploded into chaos. Several people argued that there are no parents in any of the Disney movies, some said that there were, but they were dead. Another interwoven theme was the concept of growing up. All the books we discussed (Alice, Peter Pan, etc) had the concept of growing up or the resistance to growing up. Overall the class was great, as I was quite interested in hearing what other people thought of this book and to see if there were overarching themes about these 4 books that were on the list. Let's see what next week brings us.
Interesting theories/information:
This is one of those books where there is an endless source of speculation and theorization about the symbolism and secrets that this book could have. For instance, did you know what the author, Lewis Carroll, wasn't a professional writer but a mathematician? This could explain the abundance of puzzles involving maths in this book. Another interesting thing in this book is the use of riddles. ‘Lewis Carroll’ is a pen-name and a riddle in itself. Charles Lutwidge Dodgson took his first and middle names, translated them into their Latin form ‘Carolus Lodovicus’ reversed the words and then translated them back into English(QI website).
Sources:
M. Tatar (2009) Why children should read Alice in Wonderland Retrieved 6th of September 2013 from https://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tatar/2009/09/19/why-children-should-read-alice-in-wonderland/
Complete reader (2013, p21), Youth Literature
QI.com (2013) Retrieved 18th of September from http://qi.com/infocloud/alice-in-wonderland
I also read Alice in Wonderland and I think Marco and I have the same idea about this book, there is not much difference in that.
ReplyDeleteI do think that he described really well why he would recommend this to HAVO3 studens, I had not looked at it in that way, but I think he has a really good point with saying that it offers them a big variety in writing styles.
I like the way you start off with an introduction about yourself loving literature. I know the story about Alice in Wonderland, but I didn't read it. I think you summarized the story very well, including your first impressions and thoughts. Besides that I think you did a great job on arguing about what age the book is suitable for. They way you described the "In class discussion" was refreshing. You really described the atmosphere, which I didn't do so I liked that.
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