The Lion, the Witch, the Wardrobe and Huskies

-
I admit I never actually read the book 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe' by C.S. Lewis, but I liked the assignment: make a game.  I was in the sixth grade.  My sister helped me.  She was very creative, and she had many clever ideas to make the game fun.  We worked on the game for hours.  At school, my fellow pupils gasped in amazement and thought I'd get an A.  To my disappointment, when the teacher found out I had never read the book, she gave me a C. 

The following year I received the same assignment: make a game.  This year the book was 'Call of the Wild'.  My teacher was not the same.  It was her daughter.  I decided to redeem myself, so I studied the book intensively, and out of clay made miniature huskies and sleds.  I crafted various miniature figurines and glued them to a board with superglue.  In chronological order the figurines told the story of each chapter in the book.  Only this time my sister wasn't there to help me.  When I brought the game to class, again my fellow pupils gasped in amazement and said I deserved an A.  But once again, to my disappointment, I got a C.  

My best friend sitting beside me received a B.  I asked her how long it had taken her to make the game.  "Oh, just an hour," she said.  I'd spent all weekend from morning 'til night on mine, meticulously crafting these mini statues, and received scant attention for the effort I'd put in.  It wasn't fair, I felt, but looking back, I remember how much I loved creating those mini huskies.  I guess I felt like I was recreating the story.  I felt like I was making the story come alive.  I could see the entire story from a bird's eye view.  Instead of having to read through the odd hundred pages and see the dogs and sleds and other characters only in black and white, the story had unfolded before my eyes and all within not even a square metre.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Farmer And His Sons

-
Taken from Headway's Intermediate Student's Book: The Farmer And His Sons There was once an old, dying farmer who had worked hard in his vineyard all his life.  Before he died he wanted to teach his three sons how to be good farmers.  So he called them to his bedside and said, 'My boys, I have an important secret to tell you: there is a great treasure buried in the vineyard.  Promise me that you will look for it when I am dead.' The sons gave their promise and as soon as their father had died they began looking for the treasure.  They worked very hard in the hot sun and while they were working they thought about what their father had said.  They pictured boxes of cold coins, diamond necklaces, and other such things.  Soon they had dug up every inch of the vineyard but they found not a single penny.  They were very upset because they felt that all their hard work had been for nothing.   However, a few months later the grapes started to appear on the vines.  Their grapes ...
Read more

Speech technique No.2 - the Unifying Metaphor

-
The Unifying Metaphor: As opposed to a simile which compares two objects using a specific linguistic form, eg. the man was as brave as a lion, a metaphor compares two objects by equating the one with the other, eg. he was a brave lion.   Literally the man was not a lion, but figuratively he was.   This figure of speech is used in literary works of all kinds, including poems and news articles. The Unifying Metaphor aims to unify people.   An example of an American metaphor is the Camel man.   He is healthy, strong and tanned, and he can survive in the wild bushveld with merely a pocketknife and a piece of string.   He drives a 4x4, and he works hard all day.   This is the image of the Camel man – please correct me if I’m wrong.   The logic and truth behind this image may elude us, but what unifies us is what Elgin (1980: p. 227) calls the consensus perception . As a unity, we have reached consensus about the perception of the Camel man.   The theory reminds of the Jung’s colle...
Read more

Bevor ich geboren bin, bin ich gestorben.

-
Image
Bevor ich geboren bin, bin ich gestorben. Warum bleiben dann Gefühle meines eigenen Gewissens? Warum bleiben die Gedanken und die Träume meines eigenen Lebens, wenn mich doch Gott neu geschaffen hat, mir neues Blut gegeben hat, mich in eine neue Familie hat gebracht? Ich will nicht mehr traurig sein, dass mein Leben mir wie nichts vorkommt, dass ich mir so unglaublich wertlos vorkomme, und stattdessen will ich den Glauben fassen, dass Gott mich tatsächlich in Seinen Händen trägt, und mich wirklich beschützt vom Bösen. Ich will mich vergessen, mich verlieben, und dann für andere leben, für einen Sinn außerhalb meiner Wünsche, eine Gnade und Liebe erfahren, die nicht aus dieser Welt stammt, sondern ganz weit entfernt und doch so nah. Ich freue mich auf keinen Tod, doch meiner ist schon vergangen, und mein neues Leben hat schon begonnen, jedoch sieht es manchmal nicht danach aus, und ich schäme mich, dass ich mich nicht mehr hab vertraut an den Herrn, den lieben ...
Read more