Old School Tobias Wolff Analysis

Every word written or read is a chance to better yourself or someone else. Our words carry an enormous significance with them. Even if a person doesn’t enjoy reading or writing, they can not deny that fact. I bring this up because reading and writing has shaped me into the person I am today. So it is no surprise that I am willing to rant about how great reading and writing can be.

There are many who strive to become famous writers and although some succeed, many do not find such great prosperity. In the words of bestselling author Stephen King, “while it is impossible to make a competent writer out of a bad writer, and while it is equally impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one,” (142). King’s thesis from his novel On Writing can be debated because with “hard work, dedication, and timely help” it is possible for a writer of any skill level to improve to become better. On Writing is intended to teach the basic skills of writing so readers can develop writing skills to progress to be better writers. If one has passion for writing, patience, and the willingness to learn they will succeed in becoming great writers.

Many authors use different structures for their writings. This can relate to Gary Soto’s “The Jacket” and “Seventh Grade”. “The Jacket” and “Seventh Grade” have different structures which build up their plot. Three main structural distinctions between “Seventh Grade” and “The Jacket” are their point of view, the setting, and the type of conflict.

Another big point in Prose’s essay is the assignments associated with high school literature. She argues that teachers make students write around the books and not about the books they read. “No wonder students are rarely asked to consider what was actually written by these hopeless racists and sociopaths. Instead, they’re told to write around the book, or, better yet, write their own books,” (430). The assignments that teachers give these days are nto about the book or the story itself. They usually ask the student to rewrite the ending, or ask what the student would do if they were in the same situation as the character. Prose argues that high school students are seen as having the same experience as some of the characters they read about, such as Jay Gatsby in The Great Gatsby. “And is it any wonder that

Frost’s poem has a great sense of irony towards the end, “I shall be telling this with a sigh / somewhere ages and ages hence” (16-17). The irony is that while he’s making his choice he is already anticipating how he will tell the story in the future, almost adding a sense of drama

In “The Liar,” Tobias Wolff reveals, that lying can divide a community and ultimately hurt the liar (or the person who lies.). Throughout the short story there are multiple examples of James’s lies hurting others and tearing his family apart. His compulsive lying begins when he lies to his mother about where his father died, after carrying his father’s body to rest in a bed, his mother arrives home and assumes that her husband died in bed, “This seemed important to her and I didn’t tell her otherwise.” James does not see error in not telling his mother; believing that the fact his father died in bed was “important to her,” not informing his mother of the real place his father died also removes the actuality of his father’s death. This quotation

Staring at the screen, the young author sighed in frustration, her fingers once again failing her as she was distracted by the din of the news on TV. Resigned, she shut it off and turned back to her blank document wishing for the ability to channel her emotions towards the high expectations placed before her, as well as the stigmas. She was growing tired of the starkness of the world around her.

Throughout Old School, by Tobias Wolff, privilege has a significant and negative impact on the lives of many people on campus, and the narrator. Privilege is very prevalent in the unique all boys environment in which the story is told. Many of the students have a very self-centered and egotistical attitude where self image and success is valued far beyond morals and character. The narrator, who comes from a different background than most of his peers, falls victim to the harsh and competitive expectations placed on him by the culture of his school. Feeling immense pressure to succeed and acquire status, the narrator is weakened by his lack of wealth, falls victim to the anti semitic environment, and out of jealously cheats on an assignment which ultimately leads to his unfortunate dismissal.

In modern society, we often face competition to survive. We may forget our own truth because of our selfish behavior. However, no person can say that people who value their integrity highly are good people, and no one is curious about what is and is not really ethical behavior. There are always certain experiences that shape a person's moral standpoint and integrity. In Old School by Tobias Wolff, he expresses this message in the book. The main character of the book, is a fictional alter ego of Tobias Wolff. Throughout this novel, He is trying to provide the basis of truth by using various scenes, characters, and other incidents, he expressed it. Reading this novel, the audience will probably be curious about what is true and untruthful. Wolff did not say the name of the protagonist in this novel, but by writing in the first person, he portrayed the main charger as another self of himself, and through this manner, readers have had the opportunity to lead themselves. Readers are left to ask, “what is the truthfulness and false in our live.

In literary education, from childhood to maturity, individuals are taught how to write not to improve themselves as critical thinkers, but to fulfill the requirements given to them in a prompt. Whether to analyze or argue, this form of writing has led to a cease of literary improvement in students today, making many question the effectiveness of writing classes. Mike Bunns, in his article “To Read like a Writer”, explores this topic and stresses the necessity for young readers to critically examine the author’s choices in order to improve their own pieces of work. Bunns effectively argues to his audience of college students that improved comprehension comes from focusing on the rhetorical choices authors decide to make in their compositions by tying personal narratives with repetitive questioning throughout his article.

Marian Evans Lewes relates to aspiring writers by subtly elucidating her own anticipation in order to draw attention to the common misconceptions young people possess about writing. Lewes quickly states how “exultation is a dream before achievement and rarely comes after” (Lewes 8-9). By creating a short and concise sentence, Lewes quickly informs the reader of how in one’s youth, triumph and elation are expected results of one’s work. Yet the reality is that these are attributes that scarcely accompany one’s achievement. Lewes immediately juxtaposes her previously succinct point what that of a lengthy conclusion she has developed. She determines how after one has completed a piece of writing they feel as though their bodies became the system in which writing “develop[s] and grow[s] by some force of which one’s own life has only served as a vehicle and that what is left of oneself is only a poor husk” (11-13). Lewes contrast in

In Old School by Tobias Wolff, Dean Makepeace shows his ability act as a peacemaker when it is brought to his attention that Jack has offended a staff member unintentionally. Dean Makepeace was made aware that Jack, one of his students, has involuntarily made Gershon, Hill’s repairman, feel personally attacked.

Pipher talks about connections with other people through writing. She tells readers about how reading Anne Frank impacted her. It changed her life. She then goes on to mention people who have impacted the world with writing. She says that, Bob Dylan did not even mean to write, “Blowin’ in the Wind”, “an anthem for many causes of the last half of the twentieth century”. (Pipher 437) Writing unites people because it says things that people

The literary era in which Robert Frost wrote was the modernism era. This era was a time when poets, and artists in general, were starting to rebel against the “normal” way to write

With the new reader/writer roles also comes a change in the idea of what literature actually represents. Bolters states that literature is traditionally viewed as merely a reflection of the author’s world. The new participatory role of the reader therefore changes what the reading represents because the written work becomes its own independent world, constantly moving and changing depending on what path the reader wants to take (Bolter 169).