The Other Wes Moore Research Paper

In the small troublesome city of Baltimore, there grew a set of twins. As a matter a fact, these were twins not by birth, but by heart. There paths intersected when Wes Moore had just finished his bachelors at Johns Hopkins and was headed to Oxford University, when he received a phone call. It was his mother, Joy Moore, as he answered his mother told him that in their neighborhood were many wanted posters of a man named Wes Moore. The poster read, do not approach he is dangerous, contact police. His mother’s anxiety abated when she found out that her son had no connection to the crime. He later went on to write a letter to the other Wes Moore about his past. He started to learn that both had grown up fatherless, they had altercations with the

In the novel The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates it tells the story of two boys with the same name but two very different mindsets in life. “Life and death, freedom and bondage, hang in the balance of every action we take” (xiv). Wes Moore (1), the author, has had many things that impacted to his mindset that led to good and evil choices thought-out his life. Wes Moore (2) had made decisions that set a wrong mindset that would leave him in one place for the rest of his life. The mindsets of Wes Moore (1) and Wes (2) impacted their chances with the law, their choices with education and their opportunities with employment.

Tony, Wes’s older brother, tried to tell him to stay away from drugs but he didn’t listen. The narrator, on the other hand, grew up with a mother who made it a point to learn right from wrong. When the narrator was little his mother said, ”I told you, don’t you ever put your hands on a woman(Moore 5)!” His mother made sure that he knew that it was not okay to treat people like that which showed that he would learn right. These differences may seem very small, but they are a major cause for why they both turned out so

In the book The Other Wes Moore, it has two different guys with the same name but different lives. Wes one, had a good family to take care of him. Wes two, wasn’t so fortunate, his family didn’t really care about him. I’ve never been in a situation like this but if you grow up like this on the streets and you want off bad enough you will do whatever it takes. You make your own life no one else.

Role models play a huge role in shaping an individual and the paths that they go down in their lifetime. Whether it is a good or bad influence, it will depend which path they will take that will determine their fate. Often family members, especially parents, act as the most influential factor in a person’s life. Coincedientaly, The Other Wes Moore, is about two boys who have the same name and who have lived in the same city. One went on to become a Rhodes Scholar, combat veteran and a White House Fellow. Whereas, the other Wes Moore is sentenced to life a in prison for robbery, which led to the death of a police officer. In this book, both Wes Moores’ are influenced by at least one significant other that has influenced them to become the people

The people an individual surrounds themselves with, shape who they will become. Wes Moore is born into a similar situation as Moore, but surrounds himself with the wrong people. The closest thing, Moore has to a father is his brother Tony. Following in his brother’s footsteps, Wes ends up in the drug business and faces jail time. Moore illustrates, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink right!” (72). Here, Moore proves family and environment can influence a character's fate . Friends and family can influence the way an individual thinks and makes decisions, however, they cannot ultimately decide or lay out an individual's future, hence the metaphor Moore uses. Additionally, Wes’s relationships outside his family prove to harm his

Both Wes Moores struggles with family issues in their lives. The author Wes Moore had 2 sister that he lived with, Nikki and Shani. Nikki and Shanie were very important people in Wes’s life. Wes was taught to never hurt a women physically because he got in a lot of trouble for punching Nikki in the face when he was very young. Compared to the “other” Wes Moore’s sibling he had more of responsibility to be the role model instead of following the role model. “Shani had quieted down and was playing with her shoelaces, while Nikki put me on her lap.”(Pg. 14). Shani and Nikki have always had an impact on Wes’s life. He always knew that it was important to be there for them no matter what. Like Wes, the ‘other’ Wes Moore had a sibling, his name is Tony. Tony was six years older than Wes. He didn’t live with him. Tony live in a home with many other people along with his father. The home he lived in had a bad name of drugs and illegal activity. “People who lived

Public shame is never a pleasant occurrence, but every society has its own way of punishing others who have committed a crime. Humiliation is present in everyday life and in novels. The Scarlet Letter and The Other Wes Moore both deal with public degradation. The Other Wes Moore by Wes Moore is the story of two men who live very different lives, but share the same name. Both faced similar difficulties in their youth, although they went down opposite paths in their adult lives. The other Wes Moore chose a path of drugs and violence, which led to him committing murder during a robbery. After his arrest, Moore’s mugshot was shown all over the news and he had a criminal trial. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester Prynne has committed a horrible sin in her Puritan community, she has committed adultery. Her punishment was being branded with a piece of scarlet cloth shaped like the letter A on her chest for the rest of her life. Hester must deal with the continuous judgement of the townspeople with her daughter Pearl. Hawthorne and Moore both described in their novels the effect humiliation has on an individual's life and how public shame is present in all societies, past and present, through the use of tone and descriptive imagery.

According to Marian Erickson, “Most of life is choices, and the rest is pure dumb luck.” Real people’s lives depend on this quote everyday, which leads to the outcome of each problem individuals face. In the passages, characterization of the main personas helps one understand the theme. Conflict and symbolism also help lead to the overall idea that life is not always guaranteed to be full of success. The book The Other Wes Moore, the poem “If,” and the informational text “The Art of Resilience” all share a common theme of how choices and luck contribute to the success of life.

I first learned of the Other Wes Moore in the autumn of 2014, during the first few months of my sophomore year of high school. My English teacher had assigned the class an essay to write on a nonfiction book of our choice, so I read the back covers of half a dozen books in order to choose one. Even though I did not end up picking the Other Wes Moore, I was still interested in reading it one day. The question “How, then, did one grow up to be a Rhodes Scholar, decorated veteran, White House Fellow, and business leader, while the other ended up a convicted murderer serving a life sentence?” is posed on the back of the book, and I wanted to know the answer (Moore Back Cover).

When I was first told that I had to read The Other Wes Moore, I told myself "Great, another boring book to read" as I am not a reader. However, I was wrong; this story about two boys around the same age, same name, raised by single mothers and around the same neighborhood, but as they grew to be adults due to the choices they made, they had different outcomes in life. I was able to actually relate to some parts of the book and knew how they felt at the moment and for me, that is what a great book is about.

The factors that Moore highlights in Part One include , no father figures, new environments and new friends. At early ages, both boys did not have a father around to help guide them. The author Wes lost his father at the age of three and the other Wes never met his father. However, the Other Wes had a brother that he looked up too while the author had only two sisters and his mother. In Chapter 1, Moore writes, “I was holding my uncle Vin’s hand when I looked into the casket and asked my father, ‘Daddy, are you going to come with us?’.” In other words, Moore did not understand that his father passed away, thus leaving him without the fatherly guidance every boy needs. As with the other Wes, he had his brother Tony to look up too but Tony wanted his brother to be nothing like him. In Chapter 2, Moore writes, “He loved his brother but had learned to ignore his occasional ‘do as I say, not as I do’ tirades.” Moore is basically stating that Tony wanted his brother to have a better life than

Try to reach out to them and help them. The other Wes Moore is struggling and having. A tough time making the right decisions between friends, school and family. He also has a lot of pressure on him because of how they have moved around a bit and he is in a new place. Other Wes is making bad decisions and getting into trouble and into what his brother does not want him to be in, "the drug game." Tony, Wes's older brother, has heard that his brother is getting into trouble and is not taking school seriously. Tony try's to help Wes by "talking sense" into Wes. "Tony had been overwhelmed by that load years ago. Now he wanted to help WEs manage his..." (Moore 34). Tony obviously cares about his brother and wants to help him Ina my way he can. Tony feels responsible for how Wes's life is turning out so he also feels it is his job to look after his younger brother and see that he is on the right path. Tony is very protective of Wes and he does not want Wes to follow in his footsteps to become a drug seller and get into all of the trouble he is in. Tony knows that the drug system lots of benefits but he also knows that the consequences outweigh the benefits. Tony also knows that this would be too big of a burden on for a young boy. Tony's care for Wes shows that he supports and want the best for Wes, his younger brother. Tony also has experienced this first hand and

In The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates ( New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2010), the first Wes tells the story about two kids with the same name and very similar lifestyles, growing up, but ending up in two completely different places with their lives.

Wes Moore grew up being the man of his household. With an absent father, a full-time working mother, and a drug dealing half-brother, Wes’s life was off to a bitter start. He was surrounded by drugs; his mom used drugs to ease her stress, his half-brother got into gang violence because of drugs, and his friends were drug dealers as well. In the book The Other Wes Moore by Wes Moore, the Other Wes started the drug game at a young age despite his brother and mothers attempts to stop him. Wes grew up in a broken home, harsh streets, and an unmotivating school environment.