There is a high percentage of high school students that do not speak up about the bad things that happen in their life maybe if they did people could possible help them out. In the book “Speak” by Laurie Halse Anderson is about a freshmen in high school that ends up going to a party and a bad thing happens to her that would emotionally scar her for her whole freshmen year. There are a lot of people that claim to help her but the main three are Ivy, David Petrakis, and last her art teacher Mr.Freeman.
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One person that attempts to help Melinda out is a kid in her class named David Petrakis. Melinda gets into a argument in the middle of class one day and the most quietest kid in class (David) stands up for Melinda and speaks about how even students have the power of freedom of speech, it is not just for adults. “This revolutionary spirit is even breaking out in social studies class. David Petrakis is fighting back about the freedom of speech thing” (Anderson 67).
The whole reason why David is arguing is because he is standing up for what is right and putting down what is wrong. Another person that helped out Melinda is Ivy. Ivy is one of Melinda’s ex best friends that she has art with, she is one of the few to become friends with Melinda again before knowing the reason why she called the cops at the party. Ivy is the one I think helped out Melinda the most because she thinks “It” is a piece of scum too and even most of the girls at her high school thinks the same because of what she wrote on the bathroom stall. I hold the cap in my teeth; I start another subject thread on the wall: guys to stay away from.
The first entry is the beast himself Andy Evans” (Anderson 170-180). I think that was one of the steps to Melinda’s recovery of speaking up. Even though ivy and Melinda are not as good as friends as they used to be she was always there for her in the end. For the last person to talk about that helped out Melinda is her teacher mr. freemen, he was another big part of Melinda’s recovery of speaking up. Mr. reemen has all the students in his class pick a word out of the hat and Melinda gets the word tree, throughout the story I think they are comparing Melinda to the tree because as the tree grows taller it grows stronger, because if Melinda has support from people around her she’ll get a strong enough confidence to speak up. Mr. Freeman is like another father figure to Melinda so she felt comfortable at the end to tell him what really happened to her. So in the end of the story Andy Evans aka the beast gets busted and Melinda grows stronger.
The three main people ivy, David Petrakis, and mr. freeman were a big influence on Melinda’s road to recovery. The importance of this book is to always speak up about what is bothering you but the most important message out of this story and life in general is to always treat people the way you would want to be treated and whenever something is bothering you do not be afraid to talk to someone you always have friends and family to talk to to make you feel better.
