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Originally Posted by gmw
The trouble will be getting me to shut up about it  (Like James Rebanks, I'm proud of my rural upbringing even if I didn't remain on the farm.) |
Ditto, especially the shutting up part
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Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl
gmw and Victoria, thanks for sharing your personal experiences! My grandparents had a small farm in the Eastern US where they raised pigs and cows which they sold for food purposes. We only visited annually in the summer, and I was mostly scared of the animals so I did not spend much time in the barns or pastures. I stayed inside the farm house with a book and being with my grandma in the kitchen. My brother, on the other hand, liked to follow my grandpa around outside. A missed opportunity that I now wish I had experienced more of the outdoor activities or could even remember more about those days.
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Bookworm_Girl! I spent a lot of time with my grandmother in her kitchen as too. We were very close, so I treasure those memories. She was famous for her baking, which amazes me now when I think that she just had an old wood stove and a hand pump to the well for water. I wish now that I’d learned more from her.
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Originally Posted by gmw
The 13yo I can (now that I'm well past school age) forgive. I am much less forgiving of a 40yo trying to blame his behaviour on the teachers. Maybe it was an awful school, but I'm not about to take the word of a 13yo thug, nor a 40yo adult who won't allow that at least some of the teachers might have meant well even if his 13yo self couldn't see it.
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Agreed. I reread the passages and didn’t see anywhere where he took some responsibility. He expresses no remorse for the boy they bullied, who later killed himself, or for the teachers who were attacked. He brags about being good at smashing very expensive equipment. Lots of kids are capable of an occasional outburst, but he describes years of ongoing violent and abusive behaviour.
Even if he had other experiences he hasn’t disclosed, that are at the root of whatever was going on, there should be some acknowledgement by the time he’s 40 that it wasn’t acceptable to hurt people.
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Originally Posted by Bookpossum
At the same time, his 13 year old self felt that the teacher was looking on the lives of his family and the families of his fellow students with a lack of respect. And really, if someone shows no respect for you and your way of life, why would you respect her different value system?
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Teachers do have a huge impact on kids lives. But even if they were all terrible, would the values he learned at home condone violence, aggression, and property destruction? His mother at least didn’t seem like she would. I didn’t get the sense his hardworking father would either. Nor does that behaviour seem consistent with the shepherding and farming community values he lauds.
But even if that was the Northern culture he was steeped in, it seems like an omission, as a grown man and father himself, not to say he regrets his participation. (Unless I missed something, which I sometimes do).
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Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl
I really enjoyed this book. It's one of my favorite books that the club has selected.
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That’s wonderful. I consider it one of the most engaging books I’ve read in a long time, despite my many quibbles
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Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl
I really liked the format and how it was structured in a creative take on time (one of the main themes of the book).
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I enjoyed his take on time too. I’ve read that writing in the first person can be very tricky to pull off. It must be more so, if you veer a bit from a straight linear path. I was thrown off initially, when the voice would shift in time. But once I figured out what he was doing, I enjoyed it, and thought it was creative for him to try. Maybe reading the passages slowly, as you did, is a good match for a vignette approach like his.