Roses in the Desert :: Essays Papers

Roses in the DesertHearts starve as well as bodies, give us bread, just give us roses - James Oppenheim, business sector of Bread and Roses, poem written in 1911, quoting the protest slogans of female industrial workersWhat brings the kind-hearted heart to starve? Such a critical header acutely fits into the rhyme and reason of character and theme in Stargirl and Holes. circumspect the meaning of a hungry human heart, against a back twilight of parched desert environments, protagonists Leo, Stargirl and Stanley Yelnats walk in worlds fraught with injustice and unsanded unkindness. From Mica highschool to Camp Green Lake, authors Jerry Spinelli and Louis Sachar do not timid away from illustrating worlds connected to the industrial jungle which prompted Oppenheims 1911 poem rather, inwardly these American deserts, their protagonists help readers to explore theories of nonconformity, loyalty, and altruism. Through Stanleys good bodily fluid and intermittent kindness in agreein g to teach Zero to read, Leos self-conscious perspective as narrator, and Stargirls selfless generosity in giving porcupine neck ties and African violets, Sachar and Spinelli question that which starves and that which nourishes our living human hearts.What does it mean to fit in? As creatures designed for community living, we go for to be kindredd, to be appreciated, and to be included among groups. Leo knows how to fit in he knows not to be being singled emerge in the crowd, how to dress, what to say, curiously against the flamboyant nonconformity of Stargirl. Stanley also stands out in a crowd, but not by choice overweight, he doesnt have some(prenominal) friends at home and kids at school often teased him most his size, and coming from a poor family, he longs to do things that just like rich kids (Sachar 7, 6). His notebook is dropped in the toilet by pint-sized bullies and his family is nether a curse. In Stanley, optimistic about swimming in a lake despite his ominous det ainment in a detention center, there exists the comparable good humor and optimism that sustains his inventive father. In revealing Stanleys grimace at their family joke to readers, Sachar shows his protagonists strength in acquire humor and the strength of his imagination his family stories feed him and he is lifted out of where he is by the power of his memory. Against ghastly, sweltering conditions and the injustice of his own incarceration, Stanleys sense of humor saves him from breaking