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From: Linnea Hendrickson <lhendr>
Date: Sat, 31 Jan 2004 19:43:41 -0700
Monica wrote:
I can identify with this. Even now, the emotion I feel when reading the book, especially at the end, sometimes catches up with me. I can usually predict where books are going to choke me up, and I practice and steel myself to get through those parts. But, it is probably not a bad thing for kids to sometimes see their teachers moved to tears by a book.
(Although I can also see avoiding this when the students also might have a lot of pent-up emotion.)
On Thursday I read "When Marian Sang" to my Battle of the Books students. It had been awhile since I'd read it, and when I got to the Constitution Hall/Lincoln Memorial part I had to stop to collect myself and tell them I wasn't sure I could read it without crying. My voice faltered a little, but stopping to tell them that this was going to be hard helped me get through.
I am almost afraid to examine the feelings I have about "The Man Who Walked" too closely, and I suppose that is part of the power of the book. After many readings the shock of stepping out into the void with Philippe Petit has diminished a bit, but the image of him joyfully, calmly walking in that space where later so many died, yokes two equally unbelievable and opposite events together: life and death, joy and destruction, yin and yang. Perhaps the book is closer to "The Mountains of Tibet" than it might at first appear.
The book is also a tribute to the power of memory, and the importance of keeping memory alive through story. In the midst of sorrow and destruction, it is sometimes only the memory of past joy that gives us hope for the future.
Date: Sat, 31 Jan 2004 19:43:41 -0700
Monica wrote:
I can identify with this. Even now, the emotion I feel when reading the book, especially at the end, sometimes catches up with me. I can usually predict where books are going to choke me up, and I practice and steel myself to get through those parts. But, it is probably not a bad thing for kids to sometimes see their teachers moved to tears by a book.
(Although I can also see avoiding this when the students also might have a lot of pent-up emotion.)
On Thursday I read "When Marian Sang" to my Battle of the Books students. It had been awhile since I'd read it, and when I got to the Constitution Hall/Lincoln Memorial part I had to stop to collect myself and tell them I wasn't sure I could read it without crying. My voice faltered a little, but stopping to tell them that this was going to be hard helped me get through.
I am almost afraid to examine the feelings I have about "The Man Who Walked" too closely, and I suppose that is part of the power of the book. After many readings the shock of stepping out into the void with Philippe Petit has diminished a bit, but the image of him joyfully, calmly walking in that space where later so many died, yokes two equally unbelievable and opposite events together: life and death, joy and destruction, yin and yang. Perhaps the book is closer to "The Mountains of Tibet" than it might at first appear.
The book is also a tribute to the power of memory, and the importance of keeping memory alive through story. In the midst of sorrow and destruction, it is sometimes only the memory of past joy that gives us hope for the future.
-- Linnea Linnea Hendrickson Albuquerque, NM Lhendr at unm.edu http://www.unm.edu/~lhendrReceived on Sat 31 Jan 2004 08:43:41 PM CST
