Favorite Summer Reading

Hi bloggers! My name is Rachael and you have arrived at my blog. This is a blog about literature and my position and view on works of writing. Hope you enjoy & rachael-ize (realize) something new or interesting!

This summer I read a large amount of short stories and poems for the upcoming English 2 year, and I guarantee that I read all of them, don't worry. While I read them, I was struck by a plethora of emotions, they were all quality pieces of literature, I assure you. But of all the texts, I really connected with the short story, "Harrison Bergeron" by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. because of the satirical nature of the story. For some reason, I enjoy making make believe situations that make fun of the current or past scenes, sort of like what happens in "Harrison Bergeron". Maybe I'm a reincarnation of Vonnegut, but I probably don't want to be, well that's a whole other can of worms(maybe a topic for a later post......).

But I digress.
This story in set in the future where everyone is equal to the point where "nobody was better looking than anybody else" Now, that would suck, like how would you have beauty pageants?! Oh, wait, that means we could all be America's Next Top Model! Maybe this isn't so bad after all...

However, at the end of the story, because of all of the equality, the main character, Harrison, gets killed. By this the author is trying to show society how bad things can be when everyone is equal, and that there should be some people in the world that are better or worse than you. Annnnnnnd life will go on- I promise- if someone gets a better grade than you on the biggest test of the year. 

What really struck me as interesting was the fact that the government put handicaps on exceptional people so that they would not take "unfair advantage of their brains". 
(The picture below depicts the fashioning of a handicap) 

This caught my attention because in today's world its the bright minds that will exceed the unimaginable and people, especially teachers or coaches, will nurture and help those with exceptional talents to go above and beyond. Maybe someday those without 'handicaps' or have broken free of their handicaps with exceptional intelligence and talent will teach us how to find a corner of a circle--that could be all of us.

So, let's all try. Shall we?