"Since They Lost Sammy" By N.R Kleinfield

The New York Times article, "Since They Lost Sammy," by N.R Kleinfield is mainly about what Amy   

Cohen and Gary Eckstein have been doing to improve traffic safety in New York City. This article is roughly organized into four sections.

First, Kleinfield begins the article with a description of Amy Cohen recording car speeds and other statistics, and how she and Gary Eckstein are doing as much as they possibly can in order to dissolve traffic casualties. In the first section, the author also gives a brief background on how Sammy's family is doing.

In the second section, Kleinfield develops on how Sammy's death has made an impact on so many people. Kleinfield writes, "Mourners wondered what they could do. Sammy’s parents told them to write their representatives and urge traffic-safety measures." This relates back to Kleinfield’s main point of Sammy’s parents trying to make a difference in traffic conditions.

In the next section, Kleinfield focuses on Sammy’s death and how, on a personal level, it effected Amy and Gary’s campaign. “The ritual gave Ms. Cohen the idea to print a compact booklet of pictures depicting Sammy’s short life — on a swing, swimming, picking pumpkins — with an inscription exhorting action to make streets safer. This became their calling card.” This also relates back to Kleinfield’s main idea.

The final section is solely about Amy Cohen and Gary Eckstein trying to improve traffic conditions so that no one else gets hurt.

 Although Kleinfield is seemingly non-opinionated throughout the article, his use of examples and word choice, as well as his perspective on Sammy’s death turn the article into something like a red flag, saying that something has to be done about the traffic conditions in New York. The author also often pulls away from his main idea in order to write a brief anecdote about Sammy’s family and how they are dealing with their loss. This adds a personal feel to the story for the reader.

The structure in this article of the four sections helps organize the reader and helps keep the author’s main idea relevant. As Kleinfield progresses in his article, he also becomes more and more specific to his main idea.

Blog Review: "The Sneetches, By Dr. Suess" by Julia Frankel

     Julia Frankel's post, "The Sneetches, by Dr. Suess" not only observes and analyzed The Sneetches, but also examines Dr. Suess's life and reasons for writing the book. Julia took risks with her ideas, but still supported them with enough reasoning. The post is well written and formal, and seemingly more researched than her other posts. Julia seems to really put creative and artistic thought into her writing, such as when she wrote her post about Malala Yousafzai and included a poem as her opening paragraph. I think that Julia is a very stylized writer and this shows through in her posts, especially in her post on Dr. Suess.

     In Julia's post, she mentions that Dr. Seuss was a german immigrant. She theorizes that the yellow stars on the star bellied sneetches symbolize the armbands Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust, that the book was not about vague discrimination but about anti-Semitism. I find this to be an extremely interesting and creative theory, and Julia elaborates on it enough and supports it with evidence in order to show how reasonable the theory actually is. I love how Julia thinks analytically about this children's book and then takes it a step further by relating the story's symbolism to the author's own life. The more I think about Julia's ideas on the post, the more I relate them to the book and see the connections. 
     Not only does Julia acknowledge the social issue, but she also relates to it. She writes that, "Being a jew myself, it is particularly difficult to look back at that time period and learn about the basis of which people were judged and treated." She shows simple text-to-self connections which push her post to a higher level. 
     Julia's theory on the yellow stars symbolizing the armbands shows in depth thinking, but also helped me think about the picture book with a fresh mind, both implanting my own new theories on the book, and causing me to wonder what deep messages Dr. Seuss has imbedded in his other books. The entire idea of an authors own experience influencing a picture book is incredibly interesting. It caused me to relate back to Dr. Seuss's book, The Lorax, and how Dr. Seuss experience may effect this book. The Lorax was published August 12, 1971. During this time, global warming ideas were just forming, and pollution is a recurring theme in his book.
     All in all, Julia is a strong writer and this shows through in her posts. This post especially showed creative theories with a large amount of insight and observation. Her ideas have influenced my own view of The Sneetches.

http://onwords1.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-grass-is-always-greener-on-other.html

The History Of Love By Nicole Krauss

     The History Of Love by Nicole Krauss tells the stories of Alma Singer and Leo Gurskey. Alma Singer, a fourteen year old searching to find a new love for her mother after her father died of cancer a few years ago and decides to recruit one of her mother's clients. Leo Gurskey is an israeli immigrant living in New York with his childhood friend, Bruno. Leo constantly thinks about Alma Singer's namesake, and his own love who he left upon request many years ago. The book seems to center around the idea of bringing people together over past love and through mourning, as both Alma Singer and Leo have suffered tremendous losses.
     When Leo's son dies at age sixty, Leo is shocked with Isaac's death after a lifetime of virtually no contact with his son. When he attends the public funeral, he is forced into contact with many old memories of Isaac's mother. "Only at the very end did I see her again. I snuck into her room in the hospital ad sat with her every day." This not only shows how devoted Leo was to Alma, but also how Isaac's death forces him to remember his capability to love both Isaac and Alma. Leo often considers his own death, and Krauss describes him making an effort to be seen in public and noticed every day. "All I want is not to die on a day when I went unseen." Leo often also uses the phrase "And yet" as its own sentence, as a transition between thoughts and ideas. This symbolizes the irony in Leo's life, from him telling Alma that he will never love anyone else even if she dies, to him writing a book called "the History Of Love" which changes the life of Alma Singer. 
     Alma Singer's father died when she was 7 years old, leaving her, her younger brother Bird, and her lonesome mother to support themselves. Alma's mother receives a letter from a man asking her to translate The History Of Love from Hebrew to English as a personal copy. Alma has the idea that since her mother and this man share the common interest of this book, they would be perfect together. Alma even writes a letter to her mother's client pretending to be her mother, because her mother's reply was not romantic enough. I think that it is interesting how the author contrasts a lethargic old man with an energetic young girl, because it highlights their similarities.
     All in all, I really love this book so far, especially the excerpts from Leo's own. I really like how it is written, and the style reminds me a little bit of Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close.I love the way the author strings all of the stories together so that they build off of each other, and I will definitely reread it once I finish so that I understand it better.