Honors English Deibler 4

1.             Mark thinking about suicide at his young age is scary.  A child of his age should not even know what suicide is. He has seen many scary events in his lifetime, which I think is the main reason for him thinking about killing himself.  I think that because he has experienced such life scarring events that it is okay that he was thinking about doing it.  When he was thinking about who would miss him, and like how he would do it, I could tell that he was really scared and that he did not actually want to do it. In the back of his mind I think he did know who would miss him.

When he talks about all of the crazy things that go on at home and at school, I think that it is somewhat okay to think about committing suicide even though it is a scary thing. If I was Mark, I would have just run away but he probably would have been caught. His thoughts about it are way more understandable when you know what has actually happened to him. Suicide is not something you joke about. It is something that if someone says they are considering, then they must be going through something really terrible. I am really glad Mark’s mom came at the time she did.

2.            Page 167 “ I felt unloved, unwanted, abandoned and betrayed by a world that seemingly denied me an opportunity to find my niche. A world that seemed to hold out nothing to me but hunger, pain, violence, and death.”

I chose this passage because I think it really showed how he felt about how the world around him was horrible and he had nothing to live for, even though Mark does not know about the opportunities that will come his way. When he was thinking about committing suicide, I think that there was a little piece of him that wanted to live so he could see what would happen with his life and that there might be hope. I love what his mom says to him when she walks in on him with the knife, I really think that it motivated him more to be a better kid and not think about suicide. It makes him stronger and I just loved that because he is such a smart boy and really has an opportunity to do many things in the future if he stays in school. I do think it was a good thing that he got caught and is told to go back to school, because he is such a bright and caring student.

3. Why do you think tsotsis killed that man? What were some of the reasons why he did it?

Do you think it was a good thing to give mark the books, comics, and puzzles? Why?

1.       Seeing the dystopian society in Kaffir Boy is clearly visible, compared to the dystopian atmospheres of the fiction books: Harrison Bergeron & Animal Farm. Dystopian stories are usually characterized by oppression and poverty and in Kaffir Boy you definitely see it. In Animal Farm, the animals view it as a utopia but as the story goes on they slowly start to figure out that it is really a dystopia. I think that the humor of Animal Farm makes it really hard to see the sad things that happen along the way and at the end.  The story is fictional and hilarious because of the animals being able to talk, being able to work, wear clothing and drink alcohol. In Harrison Bergeron, I could not help but laugh at everything they had to do because of their crazy dystopian society and the rules that they had. So this story also was not very effective for me to see the sadness in their lives.  As a result, I think that non-fiction stories are more effective in showing the dystopian society.  Kaffir Boy is an example of why because of all of the detail that Mark adds in his book.  He is able to tell the story the way it happened which then makes his audience be able to really know how he felt and what really happened in his dystopia. When Mark talks about being a little boy and having to starve and eat things like bugs and blood, you cannot help but think about how sad he must be and how his life really is horrible. I think that Mark wrote this story to spread what really goes on during apartheid because it is something that people do not always hear or know about, not to just get people to feel bad for him. Non-fiction books are better than fiction books in my opinion because I like being able to hear about real events and about other people’s lives.