Bronx Perspectives - Take One 2/16/16

Prompt: Contrast different characters.

"Bronx Masquerade" 

by Nikki Grimes

Pages 73-167

Mr. Ward's class is a class you haven't seen before. All students have different stories and childhood to tell. It seems pretty plain, but not for long. Mr. Ward started a new unit called, "Poetry." This unit caught the eye of one student. This student name was Wesley. Wesley shared a poem that inspired all the students to participate in an event called, "Open Mike Fridays." Now, Mr.Ward has creative poets in his classroom writing poems to share to the whole class, which makes them unique, not plain. This book is called, "Bronx Masquerade," by Nikki Grimes.

Students in Mr.Ward's class are all similar, but yet different. Lets take Chankara Troupe and Tyrone for an example. Chankara sister is being abused by her boyfriend, but her sister does not care. Chankara does not want to follow her sister footsteps so she fights back. That memory that she has can cause her poems different from others. Her poems are about girl power and how they can fight back. Tyrone, on the other hand, hates school and poetry,  but he does have a passion. Tyrone wants to be a rapper and a songwriter. This makes his poems rhyme and have a beat to them. Of course, people have an adversity to overcome. Tyrone's father died, which is tough for a son to come through this. That's not all of Tyrone. He likes to criticize the poems students make, which shows another side of Tyrone. Some similarities they share is the fact that they both ended up loving poetry. In fact, almost all the characters ended up loving poetry!

As you can see, characters can be different in many ways and a few similar traits between different characters. Or they can be the other way around. Nikki Grimes expressed the love of poetry by bringing different characters with many different memories to complete the thought of poetry.