From: Susan Daugherty <kdaugherty>
Date: Sat, 25 Aug 2001 22:20:15 -0500

My memory of I am the cheese is probably over 20 years old, and yet I still remember the terror of that book. Generally, I don't appreciate having the s... scared out of me, but of course I couldn't put it down and the ending blew me away. I never thought of alternate endings as being possible though. The way I saw it was that it was that child against the government; he had been made insane by the way he and his family had been treated by the government. The government was using his father as some kind of agent and had turned against him. Maybe it was the logical extension of the child against the world in The chocolate war, but more global, or at least national. Thinking back on The chocolate war, you do have the hope that high school doesn't last forever. But in I am the cheese, the boy's life is basically over, and he's only a kid.

After all this time, I couldn't be too precise about why I think I am the cheese was a better book than The chocolate war, but I wonder if Cormier's writing skills couldn't have improved in the intervening years. I had heard so much about The chocolate war that it disappointed me a bit, but it might not have been the writing that was at fault. Maybe it was the hype.

I haven't read all of Cormier's books, and I must admit that it might be the bleakness of these two that kept me from seeking them all out. Another factor was the impression I got from reviews and comments of librarians that he wasn't always able to keep his writing at a high level. The many interesting comments on this listserv will push me to do a little Cormier retrospective of my own and make up my own mind. As Rukhsana did. (Go girl.)

Susan



Susan Daugherty Librarian Franklin Elementary School Madison, WI 53505

kdaugherty at madison.k12.wi.us
Received on Sat 25 Aug 2001 10:20:15 PM CDT