From: GWoelfle at aol.com <GWoelfle>
Date: Fri, 30 Jul 2004 12:56:12 EDT

I agree with Susan van Metre that it is refreshing to read about a protagonist who isn't the senstive bookish character who finds salvation in a teacher who encourages him/her to write poetry. Transformation is waiting for all of us, readers or not. One of the (many) brilliant features of M.T. Anderson's FEED (for me) is that he chose to tell the story from the POV, not of the smart literate outsider, but of a clueless insider. This is a much more interesting sort of transformation for me -- from surface to depth, not from depth to more depth.

Three memoirs come to mind describing non?ademic, non-bookish teenage boys and what touches their souls (before they find books): Lost in Place by Mark Salzman; and Teacher: The One That Made the Difference by Mark Edmundson; and Hole in My Life by Jack Gantos. In every case (as in FEED) it is personal relationships, not books, that become the key to transformation.

Gretchen Woelfle Children's Author
Received on Fri 30 Jul 2004 11:56:12 AM CDT