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Examples Of Character Development In Speak By Laurie Halse Anderson

755 Words4 Pages

In the book Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, Melinda gives a really good example of character development throughout the story. Melinda just starts her freshman year at high school. Over the summer her and her friends went to a party and Melinda gets raped by a boy named Andy Evans and ends up calling the police, she didn't tell anyone why she called the police, causing her friends and everyone at the party to reject her. Melinda’s only friend is a new girl named heather. Melinda gets depressed and starts expressing her pain through stuff like biting her lips and her nails, and not talking. At the end of the story she finally found her voice and was able to stand up for herself. In the beginning, Melinda didn't talk to anyone, barely even to her parents. She says, “I have tried so hard to forget every second of that stupid party and here I am in the middle of a hostile crowd that hates me for what I had to do. I can't tell them what really happened” (Anderson, 28). Everyone hates her for calling the police at a party during the summer, but nobody knows …show more content…

When she says “My head is killing me, my throat is killing me, my stomach bubbles with toxic waste. I just want to sleep. A coma would be nice, or amnesia. Anything, just to get rid of this, these thoughts, whispers in my mind. Did he rape my mind too?” (Anderson, 165). In this part of the book melinda is watching an episode of oprah and it's an episode about a girl who's been raped and melinda's subconscious wakes up and makes it seem like oprah is talking to her telling her she was raped, she just started to come to realization that she really was raped at the party and she was getting really overwhelmed and started feeling sick. She already knew she got raped, but she was in doubt and she didn't want it to be true which is why it took so long for her to

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All of her friends turned their back on Melinda, made fun of her, made her life a living hell. Her parent did not notice that her friends had turned their back on her until late into the school year and it is almost over. Her parents did not do their job in taking care of their baby girl because they were tired from work and did not have a healthy relationship themself. Melinda got stuck in a cycle because of what Andy did to her. She was battling depression basically alone, she had one girl who talked to her out of everybody in her school willingly Heather.

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Also, the closet her “safe place” she always used to hide what happened at the party from everyone else becomes a dangerous place. “It”, also known as Andy Evans the boy who rapes her at the party breaks into the closet and tries to sexually assault her again. Melinda realizes she can't let this happen again and therefore fights back with everything she has. She realizes that her closet is not safe anymore and that she can't hide from her trauma. And that she can't hide from this problem, and she needs to stand up and speak to the problem.

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I can’t believe you did that.” (28) Melinda cannot talk about the rational reason she called the police.

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The author’s greater purpose with this conflict is to connect with readers who may be survivors of rape. She wants to create a familiar setting and tone with these readers so they may relate to the story. Melinda’s mental state at this point of story leaves you wondering: Will she be able to conquer her

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Melinda didn’t say to anyone that she was raped She was dying inside of herself by keeping it. After the raped incident, she was broke down. Since, it had a horrible influence on her social life, school grades and personality. The raped incident caused her depression, because it did hurt her emotionally and mentally.

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The impact the depression had on Melinda affected her a lot. She had lost all of her friends because of the party over the

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The characters Melinda, Rachel, and her peers all develop the theme that people can learn to grow and change. In the book Speak Melinda develops the theme that people can learn to grow and change because at the beginning of the book she isolates herself by hiding in the janitor's closet, doesn't talk to anyone, and has no friends at school so far. She also blames herself

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The new Melinda sees that she needs to say something and she works up the courage to help her once-friend. This really shows Melinda development as a person. She is overcoming her pain and

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In the book Speak , melinda is a social outcast due to what happened in the summer. She tends to stay quiet and not speak when confronted. She hasn't been able to speak or be confident due to what happened at the summer party. She doesn’t like herself as much and throughout the book she keeps saying an alien is in her body and she wants to create distance. Melinda was raped by a senior named Andy and towards the end of the book she has the confidence to finally speak out and confront everybody.

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• Melinda 's silence is triggered by different causes. The tragic event of the summer scars her deeply. By being raped she feels something has been taken away from her, as would any rape victim. The silence helps her avoid the memories that will always haunt her. I believe she is afraid of people’s perceptions of the truth.

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After Melinda admits to herself that she was raped, Melinda starts to realize that

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He offered that her, because she was scared at that time. Mr. Freeman also offered to talk to her if she ever needed someone to talk to, but she never took advantage of it. Also Mr. Freeman was the first adult Melinda told what happened over the summer too. Mr. Freeman wasn’t the only person that knew about her being raped. In addition, after she told most people about being raped she was a lot happier.

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However, this would not be existential without her initial release of confidence being her expression through writing. In which, confessing her past through writing needs to remain because it is the primary gateway that sets up the rest of the story. In the film, however, Melinda did not write anything. This is a mistake because writing was the ‘baby step’ that she needed to take in order for her opinion to spread and fully be exposed. Without this action occuring the plot has gaps which does not ease for a smoother story.

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“Speak”, is the voice of every teenager who has ever encountered bullying, suffering, loneliness, and abandonment. I felt like I knew Melinda personally after learning about her character, I felt understanding and empathy towards her. Something I was really gripped by was Melinda’s decision making process, which made me understand her feelings and reactions towards others. It seems that Melinda had 2 personalities; a careful always alert, depressed goody two shoes, and someone who just wants to have fun, take risks, and be rebellious. Whenever Melinda wanted to make a decision, she picked the cautious side of her; for example, when her friend Heather had asked to paint each other’s nails, Melinda said “no”, even though her 2nd personality tried to convince her to do so, which in my opinion was caused by the “incident”.

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I connected the rape scene with the scene in which the narrator was taking the fat mans order. And discovered how closely it relates to each other. In both scenes, the characters are both struggling to have control over their actions, and we see this when the man apologizes for ordering too much food. The scene where the narrator is getting forced into sexual intercourse, she says “ I turn on my back and relax some, though it is against my will,” her action in this scene proves how she has no control of the situation that she is in.

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