Character Analysis: Speak By Laurie Halse Anderson

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson tells the story of Melinda Sordino, a ninth grader that attends Merryweather Highschool in Syracuse, NewYork. The author has a unique way of writing Melinda's story. She uses subtitles instead of chapters, nd goes into detail of Melinda's everyday life, by using Melinda's perspective. The author sets a depressed mood in the story because of what the main character has gone through. The central idea of the text is communication which in the beginning Melinda lacks. August before her freshman year, Melinda and her friends show up at a senior party. At the party, Melinda ends up drinking. Andy Evans takes advantage of her drunken state and rapes her. She is too drunk to defend herself. Afterward Melinda deals 911 and the police arrive at the party, but Melinda is unable to confess what happened. When the entire school knows that Melinda was the one who called the police, everyone, including her friends, stopped speaking to her. No one knew the real reason behind the 9-11 call. Throughout the school year she cuts her wrist, skips school, and fails her classes. Melinda goes through a tough time in high school. She has one friend (who later on in the book betrays her), a difficult family, and was a victim

In the novel Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, Melinda a young incoming freashman starts off high school depressed and avoided by her classmates and friends. Over the summer Melinda attends a party where she has no choice but to call the police, resulting in all her friends to dismiss and turn against her completely including her best friend Rachel. When Melinda begins high school detached from all of her classmates she tries to befriend Heather, a new student who is unaware of the party conflict. “...we kind of paired up at the beginging of the year when I was new and didnt know anyone and that was really sweet of you but I think its time for the both of us to admit that we...just...are...very...differnt” (105 Anderson) Heather soon realizes

Within “SPEAK,” Laurie Halse Anderson uses Melinda’s artwork to express Melinda. At the Beginning of the story Melinda gets a year long art project to draw a tree. At the beginning, she struggles because she is still feeling pain and depression from getting raped. But, Throughout the story, she slowly grows and comes out of her “shell,” and becomes better and better with it; So by the

Although in the story Melinda is scared to speak and open up about her harsh secrets, at the end she opens up and shows that a person needs to be strong and fight for their rights. Melinda tries to make herself fit in with classmates but has a hard time. “I am outcast” is how she refers to herself at school (4, Anderson). This means that she is not accepted by the other people at her school and does not have a bestfriend like most teenage girls do. She is all alone and does not have someone to support her in her time of need. The tree she tries to draw in art class is a big symbol of her life and how she begins to see herself as a brave person and face her problems. She overcomes her fear of Andy, makes new friends, and becomes brave. She faces these struggles through hard work and grows as a person like a seed growing into a large tree that's full of life. Speak, a book with a static and scared main character or a growing girl that sprouts into a tree of life and strength.

Melinda was an outcast and loner in high school who was overwhelmed, fearful, and confused with her life and her environment at school. She was always silent in class and afraid to speak in front of people. Many students today might feel the need to fit in with other people so they wouldn’t have to be looked down upon. As we take a look at Melinda’s life we’ll be able to see how she handles her daily conflicts. In the book, Speak, Melinda Sordino, an incoming freshman at Merryweather High, starts her year off with a terrible start. She’s stuck with a mean history teacher, by who she calls Mr. Neck and a whole bunch of other weird teachers like her English teacher of who she calls, Hairwomen, because of her crazy, uncombed

For my character analysis I chose Melinda Sordino [Mels] from the book “Speak” which was written by Laurie Halse Anderson. Anderson’s character Mels is quite interesting, and has so many stories to tell but no one to tell them to. This is why I chose her. Because she’s different from all the other characters, and also because the book in itself is very interesting.

The oak tree is used to symbolize Ethan in the novel. The connection can be seen by comparing the characteristics of each. The Oak tree is seen by the characters in the novel as a solid, unchanging, and immovable object. The same can be said about Ethan. He has always has and probably always will live in Starkfield.

Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson, is a story written in the first person about a young girl named Melinda Sordino. The title of the book, Speak, is ironically based on the fact that Melinda chooses not to speak. The book is written in the form of a monologue in the mind of Melinda, a teenage introvert. This story depicts the story of a very miserable freshman year of high school. Although there are several people in her high school, Melinda secludes herself from them all. There are several people in her school that used to be her friend in middle school, but not anymore. Not after what she did over the summer. What she did was call the cops on an end of summer party on of her friends was throwing. Although

Moreover, this drawing of the tree is representative of the mind growth of Melinda. For instance, the drawing was poorly drawn at the beginning of the book, Melinda’s pressure and her life were weighing her down. As the drawing got better throughout the school year, Melinda’s strength and mindset also began to get better as well. If the tree meant “to shelter”, then Melinda sure developed a very nice shelter for herself in the end.

“After a traumatic experience, the human system of self preservation seems to go into permanent alert, as if the danger might return at any moment” (Judith Lewis Herman). The psychoanalyst Lewis Herman describes how encountering agonizing pain causes individuals to become more cautious as a result. The psychoanalytic lens is based on Freudian theories and asserts that “ people’s behavior is affected by their unconscious:...the notion that human beings are motivated, even driven, by desire, fears, needs, and conflicts of which they are unaware…” (Tyson 14-15) High schools a place where tragedy are brought upon people, but their voices aren’t heard. Melinda, a high school freshman, is the protagonist in Laurie Halse Anderson’s book, Speak.

When the one person you think you can trust, tell everything and anything to, your best friend betrayed you or what you think of what happened. The person you thought would always be there is now suddenly out of the picture. How would that change you life? What would now happen once they are gone? Rachel is a character in Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, her best friend Melinda had done something and they are no longer friends. Rachel changes from the person she used to be to Melinda into someone else and different, she acts differently towards her because of one thing. She is changed by the way she feels about how Melinda betrays her, her new life without Melinda and her others friends that she has ditched, with the new friends and people

Throughout the novel Speak, Melinda is depressed and very sad because of what she goes through in high school. She is an outcast and is portrayed by not being able to step up for what she believes in. However, by the end of the novel, she outgrows herself and becomes more confident about what has happened. She can speak up against the rape and why she called the cops at the party. She displays her feelings, emotions, and what the tree represents in her final drawing of the tree.

The author gives many examples that show the initiation and the road of trials of Sylvia climbing the tree. One example is, ?a bird fluttered off its nest, and a red squirrel ran to and fro and scolded pettishly at the harmless housebreaker.? The author uses the word housebreaker as Sylvia saying that she is invading the animals that live on the tree and the animal think that she is an enemy. The author also uses simile to make the tree alive. The author wrote, ?The sharp dry twigs caught and held her and scratched her like angry talons.? The author compares the tree to a talon. The author?s language greatly compares Sylvia and the tree that make this story a dramatic adventure. The passage says that Sylvia has thin little fingers clumsy and stiff compares to the tree?s great stem. Sylvia did not give up and she climbs until it was morning, the tree was amazed at the determined spark of human

In Laurie Halse Anderson’s Speak, trees symbolize Melinda’s growth throughout her life to stay sane and pass the horrific time of her life. Depression is her first phase, when she starts to paint the trees that were hit by lightning. It is also shown by her not talking to many people. She starts to realize that she cannot be perfect when she imagines a beautiful oak tree but really cannot carve it properly. Her third phase comes when the trees outside her house has a few sick branches and she decides to let go of the present Melinda who is not letting her grow and nurture the old Melinda, the one before the party, the fun and outgoing one. The last phase, and tree was the one she drew for

Melinda Sordino, the character in the novel Speak, written by Laurie Halse Anderson. She is an outcast, coward, and a negative person. Melinda Sordino is an outcast. '' Or I could crawl behind the trash can. Or maybe I could dump my lunch straight into the trash and keep moving right on out the door '' (Anderson 8). This quotation clearly demonstrates that Melinda is an outcast. She cannot even think a person she could sit. On the first day, Melinda gets into the auditorium and everyone divides into their clans. She used to be a part of the Plain Janes but now she labelled herself an outcast, she is clanless. Melinda does not see the point in finding her ex-friends. She knows it is not going to work. The only student talks to her as a friend is Heather, new to here, but she