Commentary on ‘the Lesson' by Roger Mcgough

In "The Lesson" it talks about a group of children who lives in the slum of New York City in the 1970s. Sylvia the main character is ignorant, rude and stubborn. In the summer all she wanted to do is have fun with her friends however, Miss Moore a well educated black woman took it upon her self to take Sylvia and her friends to a toy store called F.O.A schwarz in manhattan. On the trip Miss Moore is trying to show them a different world , the "real world" something the children are not accustom to seeing. She's helping them to figure their identity and how they are as a person. At the end Sylvia realizes that she is a strong and intelligent individual.

The narrator in "The Lesson" is a young girl named Sylvia who tells the story in first person. Through her we get a picture of the difficulties experienced from growing up in a poor

The poem does not follow a rhyme scheme or meter, which means that there is rhythm in the poem and it makes the poem more like a song. The poem has four stanza’s and has five lines within each stanza.

The soldiers who had attended the war were shown to have died brutally, like “cattle”, yet when reaching the home front, it is seen that they are laid to rest in a much more civil and dignified manner. The concept of this can be seen as an extended metaphor throughout the entire poem, with the battle front seen as a world filled with violence, fear and destruction, where as the home front is perceived as a place marked by order and ritual, a civilized world. The second sonnet opens with “What candles may be held to speed them all?”, invoking a more softer and compassionate tone towards the audience, more specifically through Owen’s use of a rhetorical question. It captures the readers’ attention, engaging them to feel empathetic and notice the shift of energy from anger and bitterness to a sadder and more somber tone. Owen’s use of descriptive language, as simple as it seems, such as ‘boys’ and ‘girls’ provokes the audience to view the horrors of the war as if they had been placed onto children, because in reality the ‘men; who had signed themselves into war to fight in glory for their country had really only just been boys themselves.

Growth within characters makes them more appealing. Toni Cade Bambara’s “The Lesson” conveys character growth as a way to achieve more appealing characters. “The Lesson” follows an obnoxious girl named Sylvia who goes on a trip with some friends. Miss Moore orchestrates this trip; Sylvia and her cousin, Sugar, hate Miss Moore. The children and Miss Moore travel from Harlem to Fifth Avenue to visit a toy store.

Toni Cade Bambara wrote the short story, The Lesson, in 1972. The Lesson is considered by the Literary Canon to be a wonderful work of fiction because of its use of language, humanistic theme, symbolism, and non-genre plot. Two essential elements that add to the depth and enhance a reader?s comprehension of The Lesson are Bambara?s use of symbolism and theme.

The theme in "The Lesson" by Toni Cade Bambara appears to be a lesson on

Toni Cade Bambara's The Lesson is a very well written piece of history. This is a story from yesterday, when Harlem children didn't have good education or the money to spring for it. Bambara's tale tells about a little girl who doesn't really know how to take it when a good teacher finally does come along. This girl's whole life is within the poverty stricken area and she doesn't see why she must try hard. The teacher, Miss Moore, shows them what it is all about by taking them to a rich toy store, one in which a single toy costs more than year's supply of food.

The poem progresses from mourning of the deceased to praising of his achievements and fate to die before his glory withered. Therefore, the tone shifts from somber and quiet to upbeat and positive. Such shift of tone is achieved by Housman’s use of sounds. In first two stanzas, Housman describes the funeral procession as he remembers the time when the young athlete was proudly brought home after he won a race. Then, he solaces the mourners by reminding them it is better that the athlete “slip betimes away from fields where glory does not stay” (lines 9 and 10) because the laurel “withers quicker than the rose” (line 12). The soft “s” sound stands out especially in second and third stanza and it creates a sense of calm and quiet tone and evokes an image of townspeople mourning the death of their “hero”; Consonance of “s” sounds is present in words “shoulder, set, threshold, townsman, stiller, smart, slip, betimes, fields, does, stay, grows, withers, and rose.” In addition to consonance, soft sound alliteration in “road all runners” (line 5) helps to create a quiet tone. As the poem progresses into praising of the young athlete in stanzas four through seven, the consonance of hard “c”, “t”, and “f” sound become prominent. Readers can immediately detect

The predominant theme in “The Lesson” composed by Toni Cade Bambara is creating an understanding to adolescents of all the opportunities life has to offer; a lesson on social class and having a choice which society you choose to live in. Miss. Moore who takes on the responsibility to educate the young ones has intentions of more than just taking the children to the store for amusement. Miss Moore 's informal lessons are aimed at educating the neighborhood children

The first stanza is addressed to ‘old men’ and how they should not simply slip away and die quietly, they should fight death until the end. Poetic techniques

In the first stanza the pace is very slow and a painstaking rhythm. Owen decides to use long words to illustrates how painstaking and slow the war was. Owen describes how painful and miserable the trenches are by using; similes, alliteration, hyperbole and onomatopoeia this is a wide range of language use and fits in well with what is described in the first stanza.

“The Lesson” by Bambara really does have a lesson at the end. This lesson that is really shown to the kids is that life is not what it really seems. The kids thought that they had an alright life but after going to that toy store, they got to how life really is. While the kids were at the toy store they didn’t understand why the prices were so high when you can get the same thing at a knockoff store, but that’s when they realized the expensive stuff cost more money. So the real lesson learned in this short store is life is not what it seems and you really have to work to get what you need in life. Now you see how Miss Moore

causes the poem to flow, and thus lightens up the dark and serious issue of war. The lines "But ranged as infantry, And staring face to face, I shot at him as he at me, And killed him in his place." are easy to read; however, their meaning is extremely

First off, the dialect between the two are way diffrent, both stories revolve arond near the 1930's in" the Lesson" their is alot of some cursing and swearing through the story. This is becuase of the setting is in some southner state and the characters are african american