Divergent

English 10
Mikayla Coenen
Ms. Fordahl
April 3, 2014

The dystopic book Divergent is written by Veronic Roth, and takes place in a futuristic Chicago. The some of the characters include Tris(Shailene Woodley), Christina(Zoe Kravitz), Four(Theo James), Will(Ben Lloyd-Hughes), Caleb(Ansel Elgort), Al(Christian Madsen), Peter(Miles Teller), and Molly(Amy Newbold). The story is the people of the city in futuristic Chicago are divided into five factions: Abnegation, Amity, Candor, Dauntless, and Erudite. Abnegation people are selfless and reject anything that could be selfish, Amity people are peaceful and will avoid war and turmoil at all costs, Candor people are truthful and have no filter, Erudite people are knowledgeable and strive to learn more, and Dauntless people are brave and control their fears. Each faction is part of some type of jobs, such as the Abnegation make up the entire city council, Amity works on the farms, Candor are the justice workers, Dauntless make up the guarding and police force, and Erudite make up the doctors and researchers. Tris is from Abnegation, but transfers to Dauntless after learning she is Divergent, meaning she is not exactly just one mindset. She trains and moves her way from the bottom to the top, eventually becoming first in her initiates class. She also has to avoid getting found out that she is divergent.
There were many parts that were similar in the book and the movie, along with the plot, and one of the parts includes the very first scene, when Tris is getting her hair cut by her mother. Another part would include when the initiates are learning they could be cut. Everything is the same in that part, even the lines, said exactly the right way in that part. The Choosing ceremony was also similar, except I always imagined it outside, I'm not sure why.
One thing that was different, however, was Al. Al, in the book, is mentioned a bit more, and is shown to have romantic feelings for Tris, which are unrequited. It's also shown a lot more that he is the weakest in the class, and people talk about it a lot. Plus, he is shown winning his first fight then throwing the rest so he doesn't have to hurt anyone. This makes his betrayal to Tris and later suicide a lot less impersonal, and more of a thing that just happened to a guy they knew, nothing more.
Another thing that's different is that Tris isn't shown actually winning any fights. The only fight she even does well in is her fight against Peter, who still wins anyways after kicking her face in, which leads to her hospitalization and almost being cut, which never happened in the book. The fact that she was almost cut completely takes from her character, making her into the girl who just barely brushed by, instead of the girl who rose above it all and succeeded, like in the book. Plus, she never really saves Four like in the book. Talk about Hollywood bringing down awesome females leads, am I right?
In conclusion, I liked both the movie and the book, though I liked the book more. The movie, no matter how great it was(especially the zip-lining scene), did take away from the characters, whether it be a slight rivalry(Christina and Tris at capture-the-flag) or making the girl lead weaker than in the book. But, I think we can all agree, the attractive cast did make it a bit better.

5. Don't critique others

Miss Fordahl
Mikayla Coenen
English 10
February 14, 2014

Don't critique others

In The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, there are many life lessons  you can find, whether by looking at someone like Tom, Gatsby, Daisy, or even by Nick. These lessons are everywhere, and sometimes are pretty obvious, and sometimes hard to figure out. Despite his stance as an observer, someone who hardly joins into the action too much, Nick has his own little shares of life lessons. One of those lessons is shown right in the first paragraph. What's the life lesson, you ask? Don't critique others.

In the very first paragraph, we are greeted with these sentences from Nick, quoting his father, "In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since. 'Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,' he told me, 'just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had.'" It's these sentences that grab you, pull you in, and stick inside your head the whole book. In fact, it makes the narrator, Nick, all the more noticeable when he reserves his judgement.

In another part of the book, it is admitted that critiquing someone who may or may not have had all the advantages he had is something he finds himself unable to do. Because of that, he is able to truly befriend Gatsby, something very few people even attempt to try, not for the difficulty, but because of how they had already started judging Gatsby, not even from knowing the man himself, but rather from rumors.

So, in conclusion, The Great Gatsby can offer a number of lessons, one of them being "Don't critique others", being shown by the narrator Nick. Nick mentions his inability to critique others throughout the book, save for the very end, when mentioning Daisy, Tom, and Jordan and their implied ridiculous and hypocritical ways. However, he still manages to remain nonjudgmental and befriends Gatsby, something nobody has truly done. So, in the end, it's best to not critique others, since you yourself do not truly know them, not until you've become their friend.