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Ms. Beatrice Hempel, teacher of seventh grade, is new--new to teaching, new to the school, newly engaged, and newly bereft of her idiosyncratic father. Grappling awkwardly with her newness, she struggles to figure out what is expected of her in life and at work. Is it acceptable to introduce swear words into the English curriculum, enlist students to write their own report cards, or bring up personal experiences while teaching a sex-education class? Sarah Shun-lien Bynum finds characters at their most vulnerable, then explores those precarious moments in sharp, graceful prose. From this most innovative of young writers comes another journey down the rabbit hole to the wonderland of middle school, memory, daydreaming, and the extraordinary business of growing up.… (més)
This quirky story collection came as something of an antidote to Franzen's compelling but ugly "Freedom." Ms. Hempel, while irritating at times, does provide an accurately loving portrait of the quirks of her 7th graders (and even later of one former student as an adult). I loved her depiction of Harriet Reznick in "Talent." Occasionally, there will be a disarming or funny description: "The air! It delighted her, it was brisk and wood-smoky; it smelled the way early music sounded: thin, feverish, slightly out of tune." (p.112) Of a now adult former student, we learn: "But there was something in the pertness of her looks, or maybe it was her manner, that struck Ms. Hempel as uncanny, antiquated, as if Sophie were a resuscitated bobby-soxer with a little bit of freezer burn around the edges." (p.177) Of her time with 7th-graders:"This was a feeling that Ms. Hempel couldn't shake: a conviction that she spent her days among people at the age when they were most purely themselves. How could she not be depleted when she came home, having been exposed for hours, without protection, to all of those thrumming, radiant selves?" (p. 184) Overall, I enjoyed this uneven stories. ( )
This quirky story collection came as something of an antidote to Franzen's compelling but ugly "Freedom." Ms. Hempel, while irritating at times, does provide an accurately loving portrait of the quirks of her 7th graders (and even later of one former student as an adult). I loved her depiction of Harriet Reznick in "Talent." Occasionally, there will be a disarming or funny description: "The air! It delighted her, it was brisk and wood-smoky; it smelled the way early music sounded: thin, feverish, slightly out of tune." (p.112) Of a now adult former student, we learn: "But there was something in the pertness of her looks, or maybe it was her manner, that struck Ms. Hempel as uncanny, antiquated, as if Sophie were a resuscitated bobby-soxer with a little bit of freezer burn around the edges." (p.177) Of her time with 7th-graders:"This was a feeling that Ms. Hempel couldn't shake: a conviction that she spent her days among people at the age when they were most purely themselves. How could she not be depleted when she came home, having been exposed for hours, without protection, to all of those thrumming, radiant selves?" (p. 184) Overall, I enjoyed this uneven stories. ( )
Really uneven linked stories about a middle school teacher. I liked the stories that took place in the school but once we moved out of the classroom, I was bored. ( )
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For Dana
Primeres paraules
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Many of Ms. Hempel's students were performing in the show that evening, but to her own secret disappointment, she would not be appearing.
Citacions
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Tthat is what is marvelous about school, she realized: when you are in school, your talents are without number, and your promise is boundless. You ace a math test: you will one day work for NASA. The choir director asks you to sing a solo at the holiday concert: you are the next Mariah Carey. You score a goal, you win a poetry contest, you act in a play. And you are everything at once: actor, astronomer, gymnast, star. But at a certain point, you begin to feel your talents dropping away, like feathers from a molting bird.
Uncomplimentary words, however, seemed to overshadow the complimentary ones. That wasn't it, exactly. But whereas an ancient compliment would suddenly, unexpectedly, descend upon her, spinning down from the sky like a solitary cherry blossom, words of criticism were familiar and unmovable fixtures in the landscape: fire hydrants, chained trash cans, bulky public scuptures.
Darreres paraules
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But for now she was alone with the child she loved, walking farther down the hall, deeper into the silence, the strange glow ahead of them, the child slipping his hand into hers and she holding it lightly, the whole dream filling with her wish that their steps wouldd grow slower, and the passage grow longer, so that the might never have to reach the place where they were supposed to arrive.
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Note: six of the eight chapters in this book were published separately as short stories in different magazines prior to the creation of the book. All feature Ms. Hempel.
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Creadors de notes promocionals a la coberta
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Ms. Beatrice Hempel, teacher of seventh grade, is new--new to teaching, new to the school, newly engaged, and newly bereft of her idiosyncratic father. Grappling awkwardly with her newness, she struggles to figure out what is expected of her in life and at work. Is it acceptable to introduce swear words into the English curriculum, enlist students to write their own report cards, or bring up personal experiences while teaching a sex-education class? Sarah Shun-lien Bynum finds characters at their most vulnerable, then explores those precarious moments in sharp, graceful prose. From this most innovative of young writers comes another journey down the rabbit hole to the wonderland of middle school, memory, daydreaming, and the extraordinary business of growing up.
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