Alan Soluren 13 April 2005
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Soluren
Alan Soluren 13 April 2005 Eng 1101 Professor Mattox Children Not Accepted: A Literary Analysis on Leaving Atlanta In the book, Leaving Atlanta, each main character, LaTasha Baxter, Rodney Green, and Octavia Fuller, experiences the Atlanta Child Murders differently. The author’s skillful use of characterization lets the reader understand the main characters and actually become like each child. Moreover, the rendition familiarizes the reader with how the children fit into their class and whether or not each child is accepted by their peers. The use of characterization in the book, even though it varies, shows how each child is not tolerated by their fellow classmates. First, LaTasha Baxter is a young girl trying to be included with her fellow classmates. She desperately wants to be accepted by Monica Fisher and Forsythia Collier, so she practices jumping rope and playing jacks all summer long because she wants to go back to school and show off her skills. LaTasha thought this might please Monica; therefore, they could be friends, but her plans fail. Also the girls in her class hates her even more when she tells Jashante that she hopes the killer will find and kill him. The girls, in the book, say this about her, “He wasn’t trying to talk to her. He was just asking her to run with him in the race and then she said that to him?” (47). Rodney Green is a boy in LaTasha’s class who she describes as, “The weirdest kid in her class, maybe in the whole school, but very smart despite his poor grades” (54). Everybody thinks Rodney is the strangest boy in the class. Rodney and LaTasha are similar because they both have no friends, even though Octavia Fuller tries to befriend them in the book. Rodney, just like poor LaTasha, does things to make friends. He tries to be friends with Leon, a bad boy in their class. Rodney was stealing from a local store in the neighborhood. Leon sees Rodney stealing and wants to help him steal in order to get some of the candy. Rodney thought that his stealing would make Leon like him and that he would gain some friends, through Leon, in the class. Next, there is Octavia Fuller another student in LaTasha and Rodney’s class. Octavia is just like Rodney, a reject in the class. One can also look at how LaTasha regards Octavia in the book. LaTasha views Octavia in this manner: Tasha hesitated; if she was the person that nobody liked right now, and then Octavia was the person that nobody ever liked. If she sat with Octavia today, she could never eat with Monica and Forsythia again. Unpopularity was terribly contagious. (48) Through this experience, one can see how LaTasha looks at Octavia in the book. LaTasha knows, just like every other person in the class, that to be associated with Octavia means to be unpopular. Also, another example is how the class calls her “Watusi” because she had a dark complexion like a person from Africa. This obviously shows how everybody in the class was not fond of Octavia. All three children, LaTasha, Rodney, and Octavia were not accepted by their own peers in their class. The children, in the book, were social rejects who tries very hard to make friends in the class. Each child seeks different ways to befriend those in their class yet could not make friends or be socially accepted in the class. The author’s use of characterization allows the reader to see how the children were not socially accepted by their own peers in the class. Each child’s experience is evident in the story because each child’s experience gives the reader a window into the child’s own character. It allows the reader to become the child, and like the child, struggle to make friends with their fellow classmates. Excellent organization Excellent use of transitions Excellent discussion Beware of “grade-killers”! Works Cited Jones, Tayari. Leaving Atlanta. New York: Warner, 2003. 100 – 35 = 65 70 / C- Curve
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