Andy Warhol's Elvis.
These assignments are for classes 5 & 6 and due October 29th in class.
40 points (Homework, notebook, blog grade)
Design a cover.
You will be graded on the following items:
A: 10 points: Your cover should show creativity, depth in thought, and visually represent important events, themes, or symbols throughout the book. The cover should look professionally and carefully constructed. You may draw or use the computer, but be careful not to commit the visual equivalence of plagiarism. If you use someone else’s images, change or collage them until they are your own. Make sure you have a front and back cover as well as a spine. Spelling the author’s name wrong would be about the worst thing you could do!
B: 10 points: You should provide a 100 word description of the book on the back cover. WARNING: DO NOT PLAGIARIZE THIS!—you will risk a zero for an easy part of the requirements. Remember: the point of a 100 word description on the back of a book is to convince someone in a store to buy the book. Remember this when you write the blurb. Why should someone buy this?
C: 20 points: Write a two page paper (400-500 words) explaining the choices you made when designing the cover. Pretend you work for me[1] and are trying to convince me to go with your cover over someone else’s. You will need to provide evidence from the book to effectively do this.Make sure you include page numbers and cite properly.
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40 points (Homework, notebook, blog grade)
Write a “filler chapter”. In other words, write what happens in between two chapters (or pages—or rewrite a section or imitate the author’s style).
You will be graded on the following items:
A: 10 points: Completes the page length requirements: 2-3 typed, double-spaced pages, Times New Roman, 12 point font.
B: 10 points: The details and facts in your story are factually and contextually accurate in relation to the existing story. This includes the setting and historical time frame!
C: 20 points: You successfully capture the tone and style of your author.[2]
If you have another creative idea, propose it to me with criteria on which you would like to be graded. I must approve this first.
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100 points (Open Response)
Explication of Passage from last 1/3 of book. See handout for assignment and grading criteria.
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[1] I do not provide health insurance. Welcome to the world of contracted labor, boys and girls.
[1] I do not provide health insurance. Welcome to the world of contracted labor, boys and girls.
[2] (which includes, but is not limited to: how author presents dialogue, appropriate word choice, symbols, etc.)
11 comments:
Chapter 25.5
Final Goodbye
The next morning I woke up early in order to begin packing and also because I was having trouble sleeping, still wondering if leaving was the best decision. As I got out of my bed and stepped into the shower I began to think back on the morning of our first class. I remember that morning, like it was yesterday. For me it was the beginning to a new part of my life and a dream of mine that was finally being realized. That Thursday morning I was panicking and questioning all of the decisions I had made up to that point in my life. As the water softly massages my back, I finally realize that there was nothing to panic over. None of those girls would have betrayed me, for I was no Miss Brody. I remember that we used Nabokov, Austen and James to find, not reality, but the epiphany of truth. Like my magician said, none of these books would be the same without Tehran, my girls, and the mountains. These books allowed us to enter a world of imagination and escape reality. As I slowly step out from the shower and grab my robe, I remember how these books comforted me on the nights when the only sounds audible were bombs right outside the window. How these books brought life and purpose into my classes in the University when all other purpose in our lives were lost. How many of my female students connected and found courage in the courageous characters in Lolita and Daisy Miller, characters who similar to themselves, were living in a world created for them, without identity. I enter my bedroom and change into comfortable clothes, thinking about how many suitcases I will need to pack. Thinking back on those Thursday mornings filled with literature and pastry there was no other time when those seven girls were allowed to express their feelings about different subjects, ask questions, or laugh without being reprimanded. Although those classes were a dream of mine, imagine what it gave to those girls who would have other wise kept quiet and not have thought about such issues that these novels brought up. I enter the kitchen and make myself some breakfast and than start to flip through Lolita and my notes that I had taken almost two years ago while meeting with the girls. As I turn each page a new memory fills my mind and each of the words has a scent of freedom and imagination. As I continue to turn each page the sun shines brightly through the window. I look into the mirror across form where I am sitting and for the last time glance at my beloved mountains. The light pours over them and is so bright that they are barely visible. I thought how beautiful those mountains were and how they protected the girls and I from the outside world that we were escaping. I finally decided to gather all of my suitcases and start to take down the pictures and decorations throughout the house. As I began to pack precious items I stumbled upon a pile of books underneath my bed. One of the books was Eliot’s Four Quartets, which I had recently discovered almost a month ago in the magicians library. I read the last line of one of the first poems, “But to what purpose/disturbing the dust bowl of rose-leaves/I do not know//”. This line made me think. What was the purpose of my secret class? Why did I feel the need to teach these girls Western Literature and possibly have someone discover our secret? I decide to stop asking myself these questions. There are too many answers and in the end the main purpose was to teach something that I am truly passionate about. The purpose was to discover the relationship between fiction and reality. We discovered that they weren’t very different at all. The main difference was that the fictional characters had to deal with their government and rigid society until we decided to close the pages, yet once we closed the pages we entered our reality and realized what we had to face. Fiction allowed us to do this, giving us hope that one day things may be at peace. After packing the rest of my books I decide to take a nap until the girls and my friends arrived to help me pack. I doze off and after about two ours of sleep; I hear a knock on the door. It was my girls. To think that this would be the last time I would wait in anticipation to hear for their arrival.
Part 2: Filler Chapter
It was the 10 of July 1947, as I get on the bus to Chicago I feel something. I feel as if this bus ride to Chicago is the first step to achieving my dream of traveling to the west. I knew I was ready but I was still nervous to actually get there. I had known Dean Moriarty now for only a couple of months and now wanted to be just like him. I thought that that was ridicules but I admired his lifestyle. He had a sense of freedom. I wanted that because so much had happened to me before Dean. I pondered at what I was doing and how far I was wiling to go. As I am sitting there thinking I get a tap to the shoulder. I turn around and it was a strange looking man. He appeared to be tall and very slim.
I said to him “yes” in a very petrified and scared tone.
He answered back “Hi I am Monty. So where are you from”? He answered me in a deep voice but he seemed like a nice man.
I then said “Hi Monty I am Sal. I am from New York and you sir where are you from”? I was only being polite and trying to make the trip to Chicago seem less boring.
Monty say’s “I am from Maine”.
I said “Oh” then went on and called him Maine Monty. We started talking and he told me about his life in Maine and why he was leaving the state to go to Chicago.
He told me “there ain’t nothing in Maine” I then realized that we had a sort of common dream to leave our old lives and start anew somewhere else. For me it was anywhere in the West and for Monty it was Chicago. He must see something in Chicago that he wants to go after. So I replied with “ Nothin in New York either”. As the bus continued down the road we continued to talk and realized we had more in common. For example both of our wives left us and we both felt lonely and miserable. I had to say that this was not any ordinary trip. I was not expecting to make a new friend. Then all of a sudden the bus driver say’s that there is a problem.
The bus driver say’s “we have a flat tire and we’re going to make a quick stop at Columbus, Ohio”. I was somewhat frustrated and flustered. I could not wait any longer to get to Chicago.
Then Monty relaxes me and say’s “be patient, you’ll get there eventually. If it is meant to happen it will happen”.
For some strange reason I felt soothed and wasn’t angry anymore. Then we got off the bus to just wander around the gas station where we had stopped. It was nice to breath in some fresh air. Monty and I wondered around and saw a little bar off to the left of the gas station. We were attracted to it because of its pulsating music. I became entranced in the sounds and so Monty and I walked near the bar knowing that the bus driver was going to take a while fixing the flat tire. As we approached the bar the sound got intense and as we walked in it was even more passionate. I loved it and so did Monty I think. He seemed to be swaying back and forth. I was in heaven. This was the best music I‘d ever heard. I sat at the bar enjoying it and watching as the jazz player moved with his saxophone. It was very intense and powerful. When it was over I felt a sense of loss but the feeling of delight and joy still filled the air. I clapped s much that I thought my hands were going to fall off. For a moment I had forgotten about what I originally started out to do and was focused on what was happening at that moment. I became fully interested in the music that I didn’t even notice Monty there sitting beside me. When it was over I knew that it was time to leave and continue my journey onto the west. So I grabbed Monty and said, “let’s go back to the bus and forward to Chicago”.
Monty replied “suuureee” He slurred his words because he had been drinking. I hadn’t noticed because I was to busy listening to the music to pay attention to Monty. As we got back to the newly fixed bus I felt as if I had accomplished something in life and learned something new. We sat in our seats and relaxed as the day turned into night. I slept on the bus but the whole time thinking of jazz. The next day was certain to be normal.
Explication
In the passages on pages 283-285 in the novel Lolita, the author Vladimir Nabokov suggests that though Humbert Humbert knew and loved Dolores carnally, he hardly knew her mind. He finds that he was a “pentapod monster”(284) that was “brutal” and “turpid”, and that though he sometimes knew how tortured she felt to do these horrid things for him, he made her do them anyway. Humbert’s guilt is brought to full attention in the passages on pages 283-285. He comes to the conclusion that he didn’t only lust for her, but always loved her all along.
On page 283, Humbert recalls a trip they took together where Dolores had a completely hopeless look on her face after Humbert “withdrew a functional promise”(283) in order to make her do things for him. Her expression was one of “helplessness so perfect that it seemed to grade into one of rather comfortable inanity”(283). He feels a guilt so profound to remember this as coming from the face of a mere child, that he cannot possibly see how “calculated carnality” and “reflected despair” restrained him “from falling at her dear feet and dissolving in human tears”(284) and giving her whatever she wished. He recalls other images that unfold themselves into “limbless monsters of pain”(284), which establishes that Humbert feels true regret for what he has done.
Humbert also is struck by the fact that he didn’t know Dolores’ mind at all. It occurs to him that the regions of her mind were “lucidly and absolutely forbidden”(284) to him. He remembers how trying to discuss something, anything, would embarrass them both. She would “mail her vulnerability in trite brashness and boredom” while he used “detached comments” and an “artificial tone of voice” to answer her back. This description is true in regards to their affair throughout the book; they never talked about much, and if they did, it was in an awkward manner, as though they didn’t really want to speak to one another, and as though maybe they were embarrassed to do so.
In this last passage on pages 284-5, Humbert confesses his love for Lolita to the reader. He was “despicable and brutal”(284) and he knew how horrid she felt sometimes, and it felt like “hell to know it”(285). He then goes on to call Dolores “Lolita girl, brave Dolly Schiller”(285). This suggests that Humbert praises Dolores for being so brave in going through the hardships that she had to go through.
It is made clear that Humbert Humbert feels an overwhelming regret for what he has put Dolores through. He wishes he could go back and change things so that he could have known Lolita and her mind, her thoughts, and her ideas, more intimately, and given her all she wanted instead of being a monstrous being to her. Though it’s clear he lusted after her, we learn that he truly loved and cared for Dolores, and never knew how to go about showing it, and this regret is haunting him after seeing her again later in life.
Katie
Period 6
10-29-07
Ocean Filler (My own person story using authors technique.)
I sat in the same office everyday after school looking outside the same window wondering what else could be beyond Pleasant Street in Malden. I always wanted to venture west and dip my feet into the Pacific Ocean listening to nothing but the sound of the waves crashing into the sandy shore. My father had always mentioned it during our summers together in Florida but we never made an effort to do so. Oh how I longed to venture west. That one day dream at the office turned into a planned trip next summer. The plane ride was long and everyone was too close, I like my space. I watched over my younger brother who could never sit still for long, especially on a six hour flight such as this. I would dose off every once in a while until I could see the California mountains from my window. How windows truly lead to beautiful things.
We landed about an hour later and right away I could tell things were not the same as they were in the East. The people, styles, music, food, & even the time was different from what I was so accustomed too. However it did not matter, all I wanted to the ocean. However Los Angles was our first stop for the next couple of days. Tours of the Hills and Redo Drive did nothing for me. All those people and their lose money; I was more sophisticated then that. My relaxed style stood out from their expensive taste which always kept people watching me. The hotels were expensive and time for the pool was exclusive, it was a battle just for a chair in the sun. I could not wait until we made it to the beach.
Our drive from one major city to another was time consuming. It only took forty five minutes to go from one to the other but traffic is unreal in these kinds of places. We checked into our next hotel behind schedule but I could sense I was so close to the beach. If I closed my eyes I could already feet the sticky warm sand between my toes as I walked eagerly to the ocean. However my family decided that it would be a better choice to go shopping instead. Shopping over the beach this was unheard of to me. However it was out of my hands, I had to let it go. The malls on the west were filled with over expensive attire a person would wear once and then it would collect dust until it was thrown out. Hours were spent doing nothing that interested me until we had finally made it back to the hotel.
Night had fallen and it was in my best interest to make my way to the ocean across the street. However suddenly dinner was a priority, honestly though who eats when you truly desire is only feet from your feet. I ate fast, however they did not. It was in their nature to make me wait as long as I could until I could finally do something I wanted to do. Finally over I dragged all 3 of them to the water front. I could feel my insides excited at just the sight of the waves coming ashore. Even in the dark the sound was beautiful below the light of the full moon. My feet touched each grain of sand and my pace soon quickened. Two inches away from me the water flowed up and down the coast as I slowly walked into it. The water was freezing not a first what I had expected but I enjoyed every second of it. The power of the waves almost knocked me over at one point but I just beamed of joy. No matter what else was to happen I had finally put my toes into the Pacific Ocean and it was perfect
Rodney
Period 5
10/29/07
Filler Chapter
Chapter 126.5 Believe
I was not sure if I should go back to Bokonon and talk to him about everything that has just happened. I am not sure if I wanted to know what he thought for he could hold the ending of The Books of Bokonon.
“Should we go check on Bokonon” I asked Newt.
“I am not sure he seems like he might be busy.”
“How can you be busy when the world is over?”
I did not move from that spot for quit awhile. For some reason I was not sure if I wanted to know what he was going to say about everything that has just occurred. It seemed like the end of the world and if I went to him he would convince me it was.
“What will we do if we decide not to talk to him” asked Newt.
“I do not know.”
“After everything that has happened are we ready to face him?”
Once Newt asked that I was sure I was ready but I was not sure if I even wanted to talk to Bokonon. I guess I was his follower but should I follow him to the end of the world? Should I change my stance and become a leader? Could I even lead?
I wasn’t sure what to think about Bokonon after everything that has happened. The world is coming to its end and people are dieing all over the place. Bokonon was there for me to find comfort but how could I find comfort when the world is in this predicament. For the first time I began to challenge Bokononism.
A part of me wanted to believe we would get out of here alive but then that would probably be a lie. I was tired of following lies. I wanted to get out of all this alive but could I do it myself?
All the thoughts of Bokonon came to mind and I thought about each and everyone of them. I know I have mentioned many in this book so I won’t mention anymore but I felt like asking Bokonon something. I felt like clearing up everything.
“I think I might go talk with Bokonon.”
“If that is what you want then you should.”
“I will go back but I want to think a little.”
“Ok.”
Newt didn’t have much else to say than that. I guess it was fine that he did not have much to say because I wanted to make this decision myself. I wanted to be able to show that I can decide things myself instead of listening to somebody else tell me what I will do like any religion.
“Let’s go back to Bokonon. I have to talk to him” I told Newt.
“That is fine, I will go with you.”
As we started to go back to Bokonon I was thinking about what I was going to ask him. I did not really have a life saving question in mind but it was definitely something that may lead Bokonon to reveal something to me that no other Bokononist has heard before.
I was getting closer and closer to him. I was thinking too much of all of this. Newt did not seem very troubled like me. He seemed to be calm even though we had just witnessed the end of the world, or close to it. I loosened myself up and went to him. The world was over and I should accept it. Now, I guess, would be a good time to see what Bokonon would tell me. I was ready to talk to him now.
Natalia Period 5
Creating The Cover
The first thought I had for designing the cover A Lesson Before Dying was to visualize what happens in a strong passage of the book, and draw it. Then, I thought about drawing a couple of symbols from the book, but there were so many, and I wouldn’t know how to organize them all onto the cover. Most of the important scenes through out the book are set in the jail cell where Jefferson is. Also, the strongest dialogues through out the chapters in the book were taken place inside the jail cell as well. Therefore, the jail cell becomes an important place for both Jefferson and Grant. It’s inside that cell that Jefferson and Grant form a special friendship, and learn from each other life lessons. That’s when I searched for a picture of a jail cell to make it easier to draw. While searching for that picture, I found one that had only one part of the cell door, with the persons hands around the bars. I couldn’t see the face of that person because the spaces were filled with dark coloring. I thought that that picture would be perfect for the cover.
After finding the picture, I knew that something was missing, because just drawing Jefferson’s hands grasping the bars of the cell door would be too plain. So I remembered of a phrase that stuck in my mind when reading a passage from Ch. 24. This phrase was spoken by Grant while he is trying to convince Jefferson that he is not what the whites think he is. Grant says, “I want you to show them the difference between what they think you are, and what you can be,” pg.191. I think that this phrase was THE lesson before Jefferson’s death. I really wanted to write it on the cover, but I wasn’t really sure how. Then, I looked at the hand around the bars of the cell door. One was all the way around, grabbing the bar tightly, while the other was just hanging. It was then that I thought of drawing a book hanging from Jefferson’s hand. This way, the title would match the drawing perfectly. The book symbolizes teaching, learning, and lessons. Since the phrase that Grant says to Jefferson was the ‘big’ lesson through out the book, writing it inside the book hanging from Jefferson’s hand was perfect. All in all, the drawing shows Jefferson, inside the jail cell with the book teaching him the ‘big’ lesson before his death.
Kaffir Boy Filler: (Between Pages 263-264)
Just then thoughts of my family and books rang in my mind. Could the police have gotten to them? Images of my slaughtered family appeared in my mind. Deciding to meet up with David again after I could verify if my family was alright, we went our separate ways. The path home was filled with men, women, and students fighting with one another over looted goods. At the sight of a black man beating on another black man, it just broke my heart to witness what the apartheid could do.
First Avenue was the heart of all the looting. Corpses of dead, beaten, and shot students were all over the street among the rubble of all the burning buildings. Police presence was no where in sight and every black man found it to be the perfect time to bring home goods from abandoned stores to provide for their family, even if it was to last for only one more day. Men, women, and children carrying crates of fruit, packages of canned goods, and freshly butchered meats swarmed the streets in chaos.
The smoke and ruins made it difficult for me to find my way through First Avenue. Burning buildings had collapsed and made a mess of the street along with the bodies of the unfortunate students who had been victimized during the rally. It was difficult to make way through but my anxiety grew stronger and stronger with every passing second. Beyond Fifth Avenue, the signs of the rally started to disappear. It looked as if the heart of the rally was concentrated more towards First Avenue as there were only a few fires and no dead corpses visible beyond Fifth.
Finally Thirteenth Avenue was in sight. I began to calm down as it seemed that everything looked fine. People were in the streets none the less because of all the chaos but besides that everyone looked good. I approached my house sprinting and knocked on the door. No answer was returned so I banged even harder screaming out that it was their son. My mother opened the door hastily with open arms. “Your father and I thought you were one of the victims of the student rally. Word has been around that the police had opened fire on the peaceful student rally killing many. We thought we had lost our son” she said as she embraced me. My six other brothers and sisters came running also with open arms ready to give me a hug. Yet my father just stood in the living room staring at me. I went inside and explained to them what had happened. How David and I was in the rally until the police opened fire. We both ran into a near by yard and ran all the way to school. To our surprise, we were informed that the police were going to raid the school, so we ran to the bus stop and caught the last bus out. I told my parents how the police had blockaded the entrance and exit of Alexandria when I remembered that I had to meet up with David. I just grabbed a small snack, bid my parents goodbye and went off again.
First Avenue was still a mess but things were calming down. People in the area were settling down now that nothing is left from all the looting. David met me at what was left of the butchers shop and shared the news we had found out. “Everything is good at my house” I said. He said he was happy to hear it and told me about what he found out. “The police have got to the workers; students are saying that even migrant workers are beating and killing students. The police are paying the migrant workers to be vigilantes in the student rallies.” He said as we were walking around the ghetto seeing how the rest of Alexandria was doing in the aftermath.
http://img143.imageshack.us/my.php?image=copyofcover1tv3.png
Designing a Cover
Creating a cover that is both aesthetically pleasing and insightful in regards to Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle was definitely a challenge. The original cover of the book is too plain and ordinary, lacking pizzazz. It fails to draw in readers who choose books in terms of how visually pleasing the cover is. You should choose my cover instead of the original. What I attempted to do in creating my cover was make it captivating and interesting. I also wanted to demonstrate the satirical aspect of the book along with its comical value.
The first choice I made in creating my cover was to have it revolve around the fictional object Vonnegut dons as “ice-nine”. I wanted to show its destruction and devastation, how it ended the world. Thus, I searched for images doused in shades of blue, involving an icy or frozen feeling. Along with the images I found, the snow flake background, the blue tinted tornado, and a frozen winter landscape, I decided to make the whole cover blue. I did this to demonstrate what Vonnegut’s perceived world becomes: a world covered “in blue-white frost”(179), a world which remained “winter, now and forever”(179). I felt that my cover successfully captured the world after enduring what ice-nine was capable of.
After selecting a suitable background, I needed to establish the satirical and comical part of Cat’s Cradle in my cover. I decided to find cartoony, funny looking images that would demonstrate Vonnegut’s satirical representation of military and religion. One idea that popped into my head was the show “Family Guy”. In Family Guy, they represented George W. Bush in a very hilarious manner. Thus, I decided to incorporate him into my cover, as he is an important military figure to the United States, just as Felix Hoenikker is in Cat’s Cradle. Vonnegut satirically portrays Hoenikker, the man who fathers the atom bomb, playing a child’s game, as “his fingers made the string figure called a ‘cat’s cradle’”(17). Correlating Hoenikker’s military position to George W. Bush’s, I found Family Guy’s satirical drawing of George W. Bush to be a fitting addition to my cover. Thus, I digitally painted a cat’s cradle in George W. Bush’s hands to make my cover more humorous. In both cases, important military figures of the United States are depicted playing a child’s game.
To add the final element to my cover, Vonnegut’s satirical portrayal of religion, I found a funny looking religious figure. I chose to use this picture, because I did not really know how to display satire regarding religion without it being extremely offensive. Thus, to relate satire regarding religion via Bokononism, I just picked out a cartoony picture.
Front Cover: http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/5166/cccoverfrontyi2.png
Whole Cover: http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/2509/cccoverwholeym9.png
Designing a book cover can be critical to a book’s success, especially if the author or subject matter is new. It is no wonder then that Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle will never turn heads at first glance despite its fascinating story. In contrast to the narrative inside, the book cover is absolutely bland no matter which company published it. One cover depicts a small picture of red hands making a simple cat’s cradle with strings, while another shows a large green V on a pink background. Thus, I redesigned the cover to depict a collage of symbols and events from the story that will attract potential readers.
Dr. Felix Hoenikker, although dead during the course of the novel, remains a central character throughout the story. Hoenikker, “one of the so-called ‘Fathers’ of the first atomic bomb”(14), was a brilliant scientist. His indifference to colleagues, family, and moral issues masquerades his innocence of a harmless man who “saved” the world. A plaque in his old laboratory room even says “THE IMPORTANCE OF THIS ONE MAN IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND IS INCALCULABLE”(45). Therefore, I put his most remembered creation, the atomic bomb, faintly in the background of the cover to remind readers of this “important” discovery that, regardless of helping to end World War II, revealed the sheer destruction humans were capable of. Dr. Hoenikker was also known for his tendency to tackle problems as little games, not unlike the tinkering of a toddler. However, his son, Newt, recalls that his father once made the cat’s cradle out of some string, which was “the closest [he] ever saw [his] father come to playing what anybody else would call a game”(17), despite Hoenikker’s uselessness “for tricks and games and rules that other people made up”(17). As well as being the book’s title, the cat’s cradle is a recurring symbol where both Hoenikker and Newt would reference asking, “See the cat? See the cradle?”(122).
Probably the most striking feature of the story is the suggestion that the world will end. John, the narrator, foreshadows this in the beginning of the book, mentioning that he “began to collect material for a book to be called The Day the World Ended”(11). To emphasize this, I used an apocalyptic font called Base 02, which is clearly legible in big, bold letters, yet conveys a feeling of war torn battlegrounds and nuclear fallout. Although a significant, but somewhat expected, spoiler, I inserted an Earth covered in blue-white frost, caught between the strings of the cat’s cradle. I find that many people are interested in images of cataclysmic events, especially those concerned with the destruction of nature, cities, and the planet, justifying my shocking image of a frozen earth. On the back cover, under the commonly seen blurb of a summary, I created a simple illustration of a wavy ocean with a gleaming golden ship sailing its way across. The schooner, built by Lionel Boyd Johnson, the creator of Bokononism, is said to “sail again when the end of the world is near”(78). This will come as a pleasant surprise to readers as they finish the book and look at the back cover.
Making this cover was a challenging and rewarding experience. In order to maximize the old proverb that people often “judge a book by its cover”, I included many concrete symbols and events from the story, rather than the abstract and obscure elements, such as the topics Vonnegut satirizes and the fictional Bokononism. By doing so, people will be more likely to pick up this book, rather than leave it for the next bestseller by J.K. Rowling for instance.
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