Walter Dean Myer’s book Fallen
Angel initially intrigued me because of the cover and the picture of the
soldier on it. I am very interested in different
wars that have happened in history and how they have helped shape us as to how
we are today. As I started reading the
text I noticed how his characters portrays extremely close to personal accounts
of actually soldiers and also to what historians have said happened. The truth of all the accounts were the things
that really stuck out to me.
The
first question I would have to Walter would be if he was really in the war
because of his age it fit perfectly in the Vietnam era. Another question is if any of his family were
active military members because that can really affect a kid’s mentality as he
was growing up. The last question I would
have is if the characters were based on real people. I would not be surprised because of how real
the story feels when you are reading it.
There are many characters in this book that Walter Dean Myers uses to tell a story that allows the reader to feel as if he or she is in Vietnam when the war was actually going on. The best and and my favorite of all is Pee Wee Gates. Pee Wee is one of those characters that provides a real spark in a book and brings insight into how a character really feels about certain situations. He is very confrontational so many of the time it doesn't leave a question in your mind what he means. That is very helpful in understanding the story.
ReplyDeletePee Wee is from the country so he says many of the things he has learned there correlate directly with what they do in the war. The violence of the situation doesn't bother him as much as many of the other soldiers because of his past and he uses that to his advantage. His stature is described as taller with a lean build which a can picture and it helps me envision the story as it goes. Pee Wee is by far my favorite character because of these plethora of reasons.
Walter Dean Myers was born in West Virgina, where he lived a struggle filled life. His mother died when giving birth to his sister and led to struggles to in his life and the ways he copes with everything. He then moved to New York city with his biological father and took the last name of Myers. Walter joined the military at the age of 17 and credits this to how he learned valuable lessons in life. Walter Dean Myers passed away last year at the of 76.
ReplyDeleteWalter Dean Myers is one of my favorite authors because of the way that he connects with the readers. His understanding of how everyday life really is, is brought into his reading and the characters that he uses are portrayed as people he once met. He also uses his military and hard knock lifestyle to make many factual book.
Walter Dean Myer is known for his writing that makes people feel like they are really there. He writes in the first person point of view which gives the dynamic of thought and feeling. Thoughts and feelings add an internal dimensions that cannot be portrayed in the second or third person point of view. he also writes in the way of confrontation. Many of his characters get in debates with other characters and allows the readers to see the personality of all characters
ReplyDeleteFor example in his book Slam, it gives the internal feelings of a star high school basketball player in the urban lifestyle and how he deals with everyday things. He also is very savvy with his work and sneaks in a lot of comic relief. This allows the readers to enjoy a laugh in serious pieces of literature.
My plans for the visual aid is to make a poster. In my poster there will be the left side, middle, and right side. On the left side the information will pertain to the early life of the author and what effect that had on his writing. The middle part of the poster will focus on the main part of his life and the adversity he has faced. The right part will focus on the end of his life and what he has learned.
ReplyDeleteThis will convey the message that his life was a journey. The journey produced many novels that are considered classics.
The first thing this project does is forces you to read your books and that's something that I needed to push myself to read. Alot of my friends have been fans of Myers for a while so we would discuss different aspects of his writing style and it helped me out immensely. The idea was that the different parts of his life were applied to work. The main point of the project was to be able to decipher the aspects of his writing and I learned the techniques to do it.
ReplyDeleteThis is a technique can be used during the next level of my education. College papers are based off interpretation as well as facts so this project was a great intro to this.