Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Literature: "Wooden Bowls"

Here's my lit assignment for Wooden Bowls:

It was a really moving story. At first, when the son and daughter-in-law were annoyed at the grandpa, the story felt kind of sad and, well, in the pits. The son and daughter-in-law didn't realize what they were doing, the grandpa was feeling really left out, and the grandson just had to take it all. Later, when the grandson told his father that he was playing with the wooden scraps to make a bowl for them, I was a little worried that the parents would get mad at him too, so the fact that they actually realized the message made me happy. This relates to empathy (or a lack of it). In this case, the son and daughter-in-law lacked empathy for the grandfather because they didn't realize they were making their father feel left out, they thought that he was simply annoying. The grandson, however, had empathy and realized that his grandfather was upset. He sent the message to his parents by forcing them to go into his grandpa's shoes for a minute and think what having to eat from wooden bowls when they were older would be like. By making his parents empathize with his grandfather, the grandson managed to save the story.

1 comment:

  1. Enjoyed reading your answer. Try to give a little more detail of why the grandfather was removed from the regular table and given a wooden bowl to use. This makes the playing with the scraps of wood by the grandson make more sense to the reader of your answer. Don't assume that your audience has read the story, but be careful of giving too much detail.

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