a solution to african famineFelicity had written her first paper on laying out. She called it “My Favorite Thing To Do.” In it she had described in detail the experience of a nineteen-year-old West Omaha girl’s long, languid summer afternoon at the pool, the sexy new bathing suit she had let her boyfriend pick out, her beach bag and its contents, her lotions and cremes, her brushes, combs, and pins, her make-up, her lipsticks and nail polish, her three pair of sunglasses, her tampons, tissues, and pills, the trashy novel she was reading, and all around her the colorful beach towels and beach balls, the noisy, obnoxious little kids—had she been annoyed or amused she couldn’t decide—their squeals and shrieks, their shouting and laughing and splashing, their floaters and goggles and snorkles and toys, their mothers solicitous or negligent, the wide high blue sky, the lazy, puffy white clouds, the warm, bright white-yellow sun, the blinding, brilliant glints and sparkles twinkling and flashing off the clean clear cold water, the periodic thump of the diving boards, the eleven- and twelve-year-old boys flirting and bouncing and giggling and teasing, trying to impress her with their back flips and belly flops and to splash her with their goofy, acrobatic cannonballs, the cute, buff blond lifeguard with the penetrating cool blue eyes and the dark golden tan, the rock and roll broadcast over the public address, the glory of youth—no job, no school, no nothing, nothing to do for three full months—and then in her brand new car, a high school graduation present from her parents, off to college in the fall. There had been one minor setback, as Felicity acknowledged in the brief class discussion after she’d read her paper to the class (and very well, too, in a cheerful, confident voice both melodic and bold). She’d failed her freshman classes at Wesleyan, too much partying—well, in plain English she'd just had too damn much fun—and this excess accounted for her attendance this quarter at Techno. But Felicity had learned her lesson, yes, she said, she’d learned it well.
I liked her paper.
There was an engaging innocence and a vivacious energy in her treatment of the subject, despite its banality, and, after all, my supervisor twice had warned me that I was over my students’ heads, in fact, she'd confided, even a little over her own. I needed to come down to their level, she’d told me in my last annual performance evaluation, and to review with my students for at least a few minutes every class period the eight parts of speech and the five basic rules of grammar. Though I myself might be interested in philosophy, she said, my students were not. Nor was she. It was English I had been hired to teach. A discussion class was not a writing class, she stated, and it was a writing class I was to be conducting. She could see that I wanted to keep my job, she said, and she liked that, she added. A word to the wise was sufficient. Felicity's essay had amused me, I had to confess, and Felicity's usage and mechanics were practically errorless, at Techno a rarity I wanted very much to reward. For that, for its wonderful descriptive details, and for Felicity's fine oral interpretation of her paper, I marked it A minus and tried to ignore the doubt I felt as a tight, slight discomfort in my stomach.
Felicity called her next paper “My Second Most Favorite Thing To Do.” It was on shopping. Felicity had rendered her second subject in the same manner as her first, to me only a minor disappointment—if even that—for which I had only myself to blame. I had, after all, rewarded Felicity's first effort. It was to be expected and only natural that Felicity would try to repeat her first success, and indeed this paper too was in its naive and teen fresh innocent way quite delightful, like Felicity's day at the pool, rich in specific, concrete sensory detail about the products and services for sale in the local malls and popular shops and fashion boutiques; and once again—admittedly a small thing, an almost inconsequential matter I wished were not so conspicuous in the fat stack of student papers in my lap nor so important personally to me—the text of Felicity's essay was (in comparison to the carelessly edited, often incomplete, frequently late, and hastily submitted papers of her classmates) relatively free of egregious omissions and misspellings, nonstandard usage, and the apparently random and eccentric punctuation so common in contemporary college student writing. And then, too, there was in Felicity's essay that tiny but creative stroke of strategic ingenuity—her description of her purchase of a pair of designer flipflops just perfect for the pool—which cleverly connected Felicity's second essay to her first. But her titles were unfortunate—pedestrian and flat. I marked her paper B and hoped it wouldn’t provoke an argument. I’d better have a talk with her, I decided, and when she strolled frowning to my desk at the end of class to inquire about her B, I deflected her complaint and got right to the point.
“I’ve enjoyed your two essays on shopping and laying out,” I said. "Your command of standard usage and mechanics is as good as anyone in class. For specificity and detail no one is better. But below the delightful, scintillating surface of your writing—"
I paused.
"Yes?" she asked.
"Please forgive my candor," I said. "I could certainly be wrong."
She nodded.
"There just doesn't seem to be a whole lot to it," I told her. "For your third and final paper I’d like to see you tackle a deeper, more challenging subject, one with more substance.”
Felicity thought only for a moment.
“I’m interested in the African famine,” she said smiling brightly. “Can I write on that?”
“Perfect! I can’t wait to read it.”
Two weeks later Felicity submitted her third and final essay. Fascinated, I read it over and over again as I sat at home in my easy chair, my stack of student essays in my lap. It was called “World Hunger and Famine.” I didn't think I'd ever read anything quite like it.
We didn’t read Felicity’s essay in class. The possibility that Felicity's intention might have been ironic did of course occur to me, but when I tested this hypothesis in class—without mentioning Felicity's paper—and briefly entertained a few student comments on the subject of the famine it became immediately obvious that Felicity had been indeed dead serious. Her curt remarks during those few short minutes of discussion evoked just enough incredulity among her classmates to teach Felicity, I thought, the lesson she needed to learn. I saw no need to subject her—she was only nineteen after all—to the pillorying I imagined would occur in the event that she or I read her essay on famine aloud to the class. Indeed, our brief class discussion about the subject of her paper and the fact that I had assigned no grade to it were enough to bring her to my office cubicle after our class was over. But Felicity was unrepentant.
“That’s my opinion,” she said. “That’s what I think!”
"But—"
"Isn't everyone entitled to her own opinion?"
It seemed to me at the time impossible even to begin to correct the ignorance and prejudice which her essay had exposed. She and I needed time, lots of time, and time I had not. The quarter was all but over. The much less serious but more immediate and practical problem for me was Felicity's final grade. Grades poison education. Felicity had earned an A minus and a B on her first two papers. I had made not a mark on her third. She demanded to know why. In the long and awkward silence which ensued, I considered a number of possible responses to Felicity's proper and quite understandable query. In the end I could only shake my head.
"B for the paper, B for the course." Enough said.
Remarkably, she agreed.
"May I copy your paper for students in other classes?" I asked. Felicity looked puzzled. This was not what she had expected. She studied the two typed pages she held in her hands.
"Can you omit my name?" she asked.
"Of course."
"All right, then," she said.
"Thank you!"
We smiled.
I had another class that very night. After I had called roll, I announced to my students that I had received from a student in another class an unusual essay on hunger and famine that I wanted them to hear. With no further explanation, I read it aloud. The instant it was clear that I had finished, a middle-aged man in the middle of the room raised his hand and in a booming voice declared:
“I agree with that wholeheartedly!”
I liked her paper.
There was an engaging innocence and a vivacious energy in her treatment of the subject, despite its banality, and, after all, my supervisor twice had warned me that I was over my students’ heads, in fact, she'd confided, even a little over her own. I needed to come down to their level, she’d told me in my last annual performance evaluation, and to review with my students for at least a few minutes every class period the eight parts of speech and the five basic rules of grammar. Though I myself might be interested in philosophy, she said, my students were not. Nor was she. It was English I had been hired to teach. A discussion class was not a writing class, she stated, and it was a writing class I was to be conducting. She could see that I wanted to keep my job, she said, and she liked that, she added. A word to the wise was sufficient. Felicity's essay had amused me, I had to confess, and Felicity's usage and mechanics were practically errorless, at Techno a rarity I wanted very much to reward. For that, for its wonderful descriptive details, and for Felicity's fine oral interpretation of her paper, I marked it A minus and tried to ignore the doubt I felt as a tight, slight discomfort in my stomach.
Felicity called her next paper “My Second Most Favorite Thing To Do.” It was on shopping. Felicity had rendered her second subject in the same manner as her first, to me only a minor disappointment—if even that—for which I had only myself to blame. I had, after all, rewarded Felicity's first effort. It was to be expected and only natural that Felicity would try to repeat her first success, and indeed this paper too was in its naive and teen fresh innocent way quite delightful, like Felicity's day at the pool, rich in specific, concrete sensory detail about the products and services for sale in the local malls and popular shops and fashion boutiques; and once again—admittedly a small thing, an almost inconsequential matter I wished were not so conspicuous in the fat stack of student papers in my lap nor so important personally to me—the text of Felicity's essay was (in comparison to the carelessly edited, often incomplete, frequently late, and hastily submitted papers of her classmates) relatively free of egregious omissions and misspellings, nonstandard usage, and the apparently random and eccentric punctuation so common in contemporary college student writing. And then, too, there was in Felicity's essay that tiny but creative stroke of strategic ingenuity—her description of her purchase of a pair of designer flipflops just perfect for the pool—which cleverly connected Felicity's second essay to her first. But her titles were unfortunate—pedestrian and flat. I marked her paper B and hoped it wouldn’t provoke an argument. I’d better have a talk with her, I decided, and when she strolled frowning to my desk at the end of class to inquire about her B, I deflected her complaint and got right to the point.
“I’ve enjoyed your two essays on shopping and laying out,” I said. "Your command of standard usage and mechanics is as good as anyone in class. For specificity and detail no one is better. But below the delightful, scintillating surface of your writing—"
I paused.
"Yes?" she asked.
"Please forgive my candor," I said. "I could certainly be wrong."
She nodded.
"There just doesn't seem to be a whole lot to it," I told her. "For your third and final paper I’d like to see you tackle a deeper, more challenging subject, one with more substance.”
Felicity thought only for a moment.
“I’m interested in the African famine,” she said smiling brightly. “Can I write on that?”
“Perfect! I can’t wait to read it.”
Two weeks later Felicity submitted her third and final essay. Fascinated, I read it over and over again as I sat at home in my easy chair, my stack of student essays in my lap. It was called “World Hunger and Famine.” I didn't think I'd ever read anything quite like it.
There is far too much hunger and famine in the world. This hunger has been going on for decades and it hasn’t gotten better. Instead, it is getting worse. Those people don’t know how to control their populations. They just keep having more and more and more children, which makes the number of the hungry increase and the food supply lessen.
Once or twice a year a documentary is broadcast on TV actually showing the starving people in the underdeveloped nations. Are those children really that bad off or is there someone behind the camera dangling a piece of food, saying, “Look as hungry as you can!”? And if they really are that bad off, why would they even want to go on living day after day when it’s just going to be the same old thing the very next day and the next day and every day after that?
When we feed the people who are starving, it doesn’t do any good because in a few hours they will just be hungry all over again anyway and there won’t be any food there to feed them with. Just how often are the hungry people fed? Are they fed three times a day like us but in smaller portions, or are they fed once a week, once a month, once a year? Their advocates kind of leave that out while they beg us to donate our money to save these helpless starving people. And how much of our donation goes for food to help them and how much gets lost or stolen in between?
If I had the power to provide a solution to their starvation and hunger, I would drop nuclear bombs on the places where there hasn’t been or ever will be any progress, for example on the people who live in the middle of the desert and can’t grow food on their own and don’t even have a water supply. I could wipe out all their suffering just by pushing a button. They wouldn’t have to go through any pain because they wouldn’t even know what hit them. The starving and hungry people are just waiting to die, they are praying for an end to their suffering, and I would answer their prayers. After it was all over I wouldn’t feel any regret.
When the starving people are gone, we can help the hungry people in the U.S. who were always overlooked before. TV and newspaper reporters never tell us how many people are starving right here in the U.S.
In the future we will probably end up in war anyway and all the hunger in the world will be wiped out by a few military miscalculations. So you see, I would get rid of the problem earlier. Technology will be more advanced in the future so we can make better use of the land the starving occupied, or if we so desire we can just leave it empty.
By adopting my solution to world hunger and famine, everything will turn out for the better in the long run. We can make a better life for ourselves and for our children.
We didn’t read Felicity’s essay in class. The possibility that Felicity's intention might have been ironic did of course occur to me, but when I tested this hypothesis in class—without mentioning Felicity's paper—and briefly entertained a few student comments on the subject of the famine it became immediately obvious that Felicity had been indeed dead serious. Her curt remarks during those few short minutes of discussion evoked just enough incredulity among her classmates to teach Felicity, I thought, the lesson she needed to learn. I saw no need to subject her—she was only nineteen after all—to the pillorying I imagined would occur in the event that she or I read her essay on famine aloud to the class. Indeed, our brief class discussion about the subject of her paper and the fact that I had assigned no grade to it were enough to bring her to my office cubicle after our class was over. But Felicity was unrepentant.
“That’s my opinion,” she said. “That’s what I think!”
"But—"
"Isn't everyone entitled to her own opinion?"
It seemed to me at the time impossible even to begin to correct the ignorance and prejudice which her essay had exposed. She and I needed time, lots of time, and time I had not. The quarter was all but over. The much less serious but more immediate and practical problem for me was Felicity's final grade. Grades poison education. Felicity had earned an A minus and a B on her first two papers. I had made not a mark on her third. She demanded to know why. In the long and awkward silence which ensued, I considered a number of possible responses to Felicity's proper and quite understandable query. In the end I could only shake my head.
"B for the paper, B for the course." Enough said.
Remarkably, she agreed.
"May I copy your paper for students in other classes?" I asked. Felicity looked puzzled. This was not what she had expected. She studied the two typed pages she held in her hands.
"Can you omit my name?" she asked.
"Of course."
"All right, then," she said.
"Thank you!"
We smiled.
I had another class that very night. After I had called roll, I announced to my students that I had received from a student in another class an unusual essay on hunger and famine that I wanted them to hear. With no further explanation, I read it aloud. The instant it was clear that I had finished, a middle-aged man in the middle of the room raised his hand and in a booming voice declared:
“I agree with that wholeheartedly!”
