Analysis Of Sherman Alexie's Superman And Me

Entry 1: “Superman and Me” by Sherman Alexie Part 1: Alexie’s purpose in his essay was to convey how reading quite literally saves children; more specifically, underprivileged children such as those living on Native American reservations. He begins his essay by discussing how he first learned to read. Alexie taught himself, and says if he was anything but an “Indian boy… might’ve been a prodigy” (216).This demonstrates that if he could teach himself to read and become a prodigy by non-native standards, then so can others. The author uses the simplicity of the superman comic to explain how it changed his life and turned him into a prodigy, and a successful man. This conveys the idea to his audience that one does not need a teacher to learn

strong effect towards the reader as a very inspiring story. He was a young Indian child living on a

Sherman Alexie mainly addresses fellow Native-Americans, by making an appeal to pathos. He creates the feeling of camaraderie, as he declares, “I am trying to save our lives.”

Reading is the one of activity we experience in daily life. Why do we read books, or something else? Reason might be vary. For someone reading book is just one of requirement for classes. For other, it is for fun. One thing we can say is reading has more power than people expect. Reading gives us many ideas or thought. Sometimes reading save someone’s life as it did so to Alexie. If he did not read books as much as he did so far, he does not exist as he is today. Reading gave him a lot of knowledge, and this knowledge helped him to be stronger, smart and arrogant. Eventually, in his words, reading saved his life.

Reading “The Joy of reading and Writing: Superman and Me,” gave me a different perspective of reading and writing. Sherman Alexie, who grew up on the Spokane Reservation in Wellpinit, Washington, explains his life as an Indian boy, and how reading and writing helped his life to succeed. Alexie purposes is to discuss how he first learned how to read and write, his intelligence as a young Indian boy, and Alexie as an adult teaching creative writing to Indians children. Alexie learned not only how to read but to love reading. He used his love of reading to propel himself through the school system, removing himself from the stereotypical to be dumb, quiet, poor, and to fail in life.

He may not have understood the words, but he realized the basic structure of a paragraph and how his family was a story with each person their own paragraph. He took advantage of every opportunity he had to read. He knew he was different from most kids on the reservation and didn’t let that deter him. Alexie was determined to be a better than the expected Indian child, “I refused to fail. I was smart. I was arrogant. I was lucky. I read books late into the night, until I could barely keep my eyes open”.(495)

indians is a disgrace on the name of Christianity. He says that even the worst people can

“I learned to read with a Superman comic book.” In the beginning of “Superman and Me” by Sherman Alexie, Alexie explains he learned to first read with a Superman comic book. He use this, as a hook, in his text. In Alexie’s text he uses an extended metaphor, in which he shows the similarities of Superman and himself. Alexie uses different ways to show it, by how each of them make mistakes, how both of them are different from others, and how both of them are trying to save lives.

Purpose: Alexie highlights how he ultimately overcame the hardships suffered during his early years due to his Indian ethnicity and displays how Native Americans were, and continue, to suffer from discrimination.

Alexie goes on to demonstrate how his passion for reading influenced his childhood. He describes that, before he could even read, he would recognize what a paragraph was. Alexie explains, “I realized that a paragraph was a fence that held words” (Alexie 279). Then, Alexie further explains how he correlated other things in his life as paragraphs, such as the reservation in respect to the United States or the individual members of his family. He goes on to clarify how he found the Superman comic and viewed each panel, with text and illustrations, separately as its own paragraph. Alexie states that while reading the comic he says, “Aloud, I pretend to read the words” (Alexie 280). He knew these paragraphs together told a story and even though he could not read, he used the pictures to assume what the narrative was saying. With these details of his early beginnings of learning to read, the reader can further establish that his family’s economic status had no

In the beginning of the essay, Alexie talks about how knowledge is a power that opens a window to success by using an anecdote about his personal experience with knowledge. As Alexie talks about his childhood in the beginning, he says, “We lived on a combination of irregular paychecks, hope, fear and government surplus food...” (Alexie). When Alexie discusses the conditions his family lived in, he is setting this frame of pity that makes the reader understand that education wasn’t the first thing on their mind, but what they we’re going to eat next. Later on in the beginning, Alexie explains how his father surrounded him with books and how his love for books started. His love for books was sparked from the love his father had for books. Alexie states this when he says, “...My father loved books...I loved my father...I decided to love books as well...” (Alexie). Alexie also explains how he didn’t understand at first when he first picked up a book but soon learned that “The words inside a paragraph worked together for a common purpose...this knowledge delighted me. I began to think of everything in terms of paragraphs...”(Alexie). This could be seen as a power because although he doesn’t understand, he’s learning how to understand what he’s reading and this could count as one of his first steps to success. As Alexie explains his personal experience with knowledge, he proves how he is an example of

Sherman Alexie recalls his childhood memory of learning to read, and his teaching experience in “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me”. He devotes his interest to reading. By this way, he breaks the stereotype that Indian boys are expected to be stupid and dumb, and later on he becomes a successful writer because of his endeavor to read. Alexie vividly narrates his younger life by using metaphor and repetition with a confident tone, in order to strengthen his description of his reading talent, his influence to the other Indian boys and how he struggles in poverty to change his life.

Books were in his life at an early age. His mother was a good calligrapher and loved literature. His grandfather and father were both architects. From them he received concepts of designing, planning and living. He was a shy child and loved to read. Books gave him an interest of the text as to how printed and written words could give

At the age of 3, Alexie picked up a Superman comic book. He does not remember the reason or the villain superman fought, nor does he know how he got the book. He does remember how he taught himself to read. Most of us know that the basic design of a comic book includes pictures, descriptions and blurbs. Alexie

The expectations that others place on us help us form our own expectation of ourselves, we can also choose to form our own goals. Granted that, Sherman Alexie had written a story about how he was inspired to become a writer. Beginning with learning to read on his own, then taking a stand against his society’s beliefs. For that reason, Sherman has encouraged other native American children to be more ambitious. In fact, on Superman and Me Sherman has proven, the ability to learn is not fixed, that it can be changed with someone’s efforts alone. Because he doesn’t believe failure is a permanent state.