That Perfectly Pesky Pollyanna!

 Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter

Avonell Marie 

(phone interview, Sunday, February 3rd)

   I loved this book when I was in elementary school. I remember that our teacher used to read a chapter aloud to the class every afternoon. I can't exactly remember if it was in 3th or 4th grade, but I do recall that all the students were on the edge of their seats waiting to find out what would happen next. Pollyanna is about a little girl named, of course, Pollyanna. She is always so positive and optimistic; no matter what happens to her, she looks on the bright side. You know that expression about seeing the glass as "half full" instead of "half empty"? Well, that's what Pollyanna is like. 

     I don't remember the exact story all that well (3rd grade was a long time ago for me!) but I do remember that she lives with her grouchy aunt in a nice town. She helps everybody in the town see the bright side of bad situations. Well then Pollyanna has a terrible accident (I guess I'm spoiling the story, right?) and even for a while she lies in bed having trouble seeing anything good about it. Eventually what happens is that all the people in the town come to see her to cheer her up! 

     Really, it's a very happy and positive book. I think children today should read it so they can feel good about things. There are so many terrible things that happen in the world; it is nice to read about pleasant things too!

                          Source: Wikipedia

Ms. Forbes' comments:

     When I called my mother on Sunday to ask her to tell me about her favorite book when she was young, I suspected that she would write about Pollyanna! Why? Well, because one day when I was about 12 or 13, I was going through some old stuff in a closet in our house and I found this book. It was a very old copy(see the cover above  - it’s the same as the one I found!) with yellowed pages. Her name before she was married was written in it, so I knew that it had been her book when she was young. Anyway, I asked her about it at the time and she said that she loved it when she was little. 

     Naturally, I read it so I could see what was so great about it. Total drivel in my opinion! As my mother said, it is about a girl who is always happy, sunny, and optimistic no matter what happens. Please!! It’s ridiculous! Nobody can be that positive 100% of the time! It’s not the most realistic book you could ever read, honestly, but I guess I understand what my mother means when she says that it’s nice to read something pleasant every so often, especially considering all the terrible things that happen in the world. 

     Pollyanna has become a well-known character in literature that people used to say to people who were too unrealistically positive:“Don’t be such a Pollyanna!” (kind of the opposite of saying to someone: “Don’t be such a Scrooge!”).

     Anyway, I already knew that my mother likes to be kind to people and that she thinks that if you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all. However, I did learn that her teacher used to read the book aloud to the class. It’s kind of cute to imagine my own mother in 3^rd grade! I have a hard time believing that the boys in her class were that excited about this book, though.  

Honey: the nectar of the gods

Parcours de Santé
by Jean-Paul Jody

Source: ebeehoney.com

Another character in this novel is Gaby. She is not a main character but she does play an important role in the story because she is Mariette's (a main character) best friend. Gaby owns an art gallery and is very sophisticated. She and Mariette have been friends for many years, which is the reason why she lets Mariette borrow her car for the weekend. Gaby is so sweet and such a loyal friend that she doesn't even ask Mariette why she needs the car! In fact, she has no idea that Mariette is going to use the car to drive to Paris (by the way, they live in Brittany) to meet up with Joseph who has been in prison for six years.

Mariette was supposed to bring the car back on Sunday morning but ends up needing it for the whole weekend because Joseph is trying to escape from prison with it. I know that sounds confusing! A couple of times during the day on Sunday, Mariette phones up Gaby to say that she needs the car for a longer amount of time but can not explain why. Gaby is still very sweet and kind; she doesn't ask Mariette for any explanation and only tells her to keep the car for as long as necessary. 

For this reason, I chose a jar of honey to symbolize Gaby's sweet personality. Honey is quite sweet and can often be used in place of regular sugar. I just looked it up: for one tablespoon of honey, there are 17 grams of sugar. That's quite sweet! They say that "honey is the nectar of the gods".

How many friends would not put up a fuss if a friend needed the car for longer than was originally planned and not even ask any questions about it? I think Gaby is like a jar of honey!

Parcours de Santé

by Jean-Paul Jody

     One of the main characters in this novel is named Joseph. He has been in prison in Paris (the prison is called Santé, hence the title of book) for six years. It's not really clear exactly why Joseph has been in prison all that time but that's not really the point of the story. He is a criminal and that's all the author wants us to know. 

     Right at the beginning of the novel, Joseph has been given permission to leave prison for just one weekend. He is planning to escape so he can meet up with his penpal, Mariette. He has a very clever way of going about it. Although I disagree personally with trying to escape from prison, I do think that Joseph is clever and ingenious, which is just another way of saying that he has bright ideas. 

     An object which represents this personality trait is, obviously, a light bulb! Why, may you ask? A lightbulb lights up a room, making it bright. It feels like you feel when you have a bright and creative ideas. When you have a bright idea or a solution to something, generally you are happy. In the same way, light in a gloomy or obscure room makes you happy too! Another reason I chose to represent Joseph with a lightbulb is because in cartoons, a lightbulb always appears above a character's head when they come up with an idea. Of course, sometimes the ideas are not always good in cartoons, but that's the same for Joseph! His idea is a bad one, but it certainly shows his imagination. 

Froggy

Trapped in the Present?

Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury
page 55

"No matter how hard you try to be what you once were, you can only be what you are here and now. When you are nine years old, you think you have always been nine. When you are thirty, you think the same thing. And when you are seventy, you think you have always been seventy. You are in the present. You are trapped in a young now or an old now, but there is no other now to be seen." 



     I know this is a strange quotation which doesn't seem to make much sense, so I will explain the context of it. The novel Dandelion Wine takes place in a small town called Green Town, Illinois, in the summer of 1928. Some children in the town have been teasing an old lady named Mrs. Bentley; they know she is seventy years old and can not believe that she was ever a child like they are now. Mrs. Bentley insists that she was indeed once a child like they are; she even shows them some things she had when she was little (pictures, books, clothing), but the kids just don't want to believe it. 
     This makes her upset and she starts thinking about the way that time works. Mrs. Bentley realizes that people have a hard time remembering what they were like when they were a different age from what they are now. In other words, when somebody is nine years old, he/she can't remember being any younger than that. It seems to Mrs. Bentley that she is trapped in the present time at the age of seventy. 
     At the end of this chapter, she gives away all the stuff that she had when she was young and just accepts that she is old. She feels as though she was never ever a young girl! It's kind of a sad turning point for her; however, she decides that she can accept herself the way she is, wrinkles and all! 

Fear on a Train

The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles

An interesting scene in this novel takes place on a very old train crossing Morocco. One of the main characters, Kit, is riding the train and decides to go see the fourth-class wagon. The wagon contains a multitude of people squashed together. Many of them appear to be destitute. There are people everywhere standing, lying down, sitting, and squatting. They do not appear to be very clean and they are eating very strange food that Kit has never seen before. People are talking to each other very loudly which creates a buzz of voices. Kit feels very frightened in this part of the train. She ends up shivering with fright and running back to her first-class compartment where her friends are waiting for her. 

This event is important in the novel because it shows Kit's personality. As a rich American traveling in Morocco, she was curious see how the fourth-class passengers travel. However, she is not used to seeing such utter poverty. Later on, she can't stop thinking about the people she saw. For this reason, I think this event is a conflict. 

Photo by Omer Simkha