Text Selection (YA Fiction for the Secondary Students)

All the novels that I will talk about are essentially Young Adult fiction. The first is The Outsiders, a text that was my Lower Secondary Literature core text. The second is a popular YA fiction that is now a major movie sensation, highly popular among the teens, The Hunger Games. And the last novel that I would not normally read is the controversial Fifty Shades of Grey. 

A Summary of an MOE Recommended Text...

The Outsiders 
S. E. Hinton

The Outsiders

Ponyboy

The Outsiders is essentially about socioeconomic issues existing among youths coming from different classes of the society in the 60s. There are two prominent gangs namely, the Socs and the Greasers. Ponyboy, the main protagonist, belongs to the lower-gang Greasers gang, named so because of their long greasy hair (cues reference to Grease the musical). Ponyboy is confronted by the Socs, short for the "Socials" the upper-class gang from the West side, after a movie. Ponyboy is saved by some of the Greasers boys. A fight breaks out later in the night and the Socs attack Johnny and Ponyboy. One of them holds Ponyboy's head in the fountain until he passes out. In the time that Ponyboy is unconscious, Johnny (accidently) kills Bob because Jonny says that the Socs were going to drown Ponyboy and beat up Johnny.

Johnny

Both Ponyboy and Johnny find Dallas who helps them to hide out in an abandoned church armed with a loaded gun. In the meantime, tension mounts among the two gangs because of the incident. Johnny expresses his intent to turn himself in. On the way back, the boys rescue some schoolchildren who ran into the abandoned church on fire. Johnny is hospitalised because of the injuries he sustained from the rescue mission. Both of them are reported in the newspapers on the following morning to be heroes for their rescue mission but are still due for trial because of Bob's death.

Eventually, Johnny dies in the hospital due to the injuries, after the rumble of the Socs and the Greasers ends. Dally is shot by the police because of his robbery act. At the end of the novel, the court is kind to Johnny and allows him to stay at home and acquits him of responsibility for Bob's death. Ponyboy goes back to school and writes a term paper for his English assignment which turns out to be the novel itself.

My Thoughts...

The Outsiders is definitely a personal favourite as I encountered it as Lower Secondary Literature core text. I have fond memories of the depth of issues elicited by the text. But that aside, as a MOE recommended text, I feel that it is appropriate and serves as a good foundation for the lower secondary students. It exposes the students to what Literature is -- beyond just a good story. The novel possesses a good structure that is intriguing and exciting with the right amount of action to keep the students engaged, and also a very rich thematic overtone that its readers cannot ignore. Social class issues hardly grow old. Our students will be able to find exposure and at the same time even recognise some of these ideologies present in Singapore as well. Depending on the student profile, some students may find this text even identifiable given their own backgrounds and experiences. Beyond all of the thematic issues at large, I personally think that the students will find the friendship themes exceptionally relatable and even the emotional entanglements that come along with the various types of relationships present. It is a light text in a sense that the language is not very hard to access, giving equal opportunities to mixed ability readers and learners to understand it. the length is also suitable for our 13-14 year-olds, giving them a good headstart and exposure to the kind of texts that they would encounter in Literature at the O's and A's levels, thematically. Additionally, even though the social context seems far off from our current times, the age old thematic issues presented through the novel does not grow old. 

One main challenge that I foresee teaching this text is to bring the cultural context of the text to the students and helping them to see the text couched within that specific context and at the same time helping them to relate to the themes brought out by the text. At the same time, if this hurdle is crossed, I feel that this is still overall a good text to start with when it comes to exposing our students to the different kinds of writing and contexts of literature that they will eventually come across as Literature students. Moreover, there is even a movie made that can be potentially used as an accompanying resource to help our students picture and comprehend the text better. 

A Summary of a Current Young Adult Fiction...

The Hunger Games 

Book I of the Trilogy by Suzanne Collins

"War is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength."
- Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell

Collins's piece of dystopia loosely follows after the structure of a typical dystopian fiction. Katniss Everdeen, the main protagonist of the novel, volunteered as a tribute for the Annual Hunger Games in place of her beloved sister, Primrose, whose name is entered and picked for the first time. The story follows the perspective of Katniss as she heads to the Capitol to be trained for the whole event together with her male tribute from District 12, Peeta Mellark. 

The duo prepare for the Opening Ceremony with their respective designers and stands out among the other tributes. They then attend group training with the other tributes from the other districts and goes for an interview with Caesar Flickerman. Peeta reveals his feelings for Katniss on the show, only to be refuted as an act to help Katniss gain more likeability for sponsorship later on. 

The Games begin and Peeta starts off with an alliance with the Career Tributes (tributes who were trained by their districts to take part in the Games professionally). Katniss eventually finds a friend in Rue, a 12 year-old tribute from District 11, who reminds her of her sister Primrose. Peeta also saves Katniss from Cato once. An announcement comes and states that two tributes can be declared winners. Katniss instinctively finds Peeta and puts up an act as a loving couple to gain favour among the audience and the sponsors so that in order to get Haymitch to send them treatment for Peeta’s leg. At the end of the games, when only Cato and the duo are left, they make it to the Cornucopia to face Cato. It turns out that the Gamemakers set mutts—mutant wolves made of the dead tributes—on them. Cato perishes to them eventually as Peeta and Katniss successfully push him off the edge of the high ground. At the end of the games, after the death of Cato, another announcement comes and states that there can only be one winner. Eventually, Katniss gives Peeta the poisonous berries and just as they both attempt suicide, the announcer stops them and declares them winners. They then return to the Training Center and they recuperate. The Capitol took their trick as an act of defiance and Katniss has to keep up with the romance act in order to keep them alive. Peeta is hurt and angered by the revelation that Katniss was putting up a show and did not really reciprocate his feelings. The book ends with them holding hands to greet the crowd and cameras. 

My Thoughts... 

The Mockingjay Symbol

Many teens are interested in the trilogy because of the movie. The popular sensational story intrigues them and creates a good opening to getting the students to read. At least for the first book of the trilogy, it is something to kick start their interest for reading in general. The action and romance elements of the book can whet their appetites. This lighter version of the heavyweight dystopian texts by the likes of Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World, just to name a few, is a good bridge into introducing Literature of other worlds to the students and to expose them to the various kinds of writing agenda and motives around. As a stark contrast to the current curriculum texts, the book is a pleasant change for the students. In terms of literary devices and what can be taught in the Secondary Literature classroom, it is a book that is fraught with obvious plot and characterisation devices, especially with juxtaposition and comparisons. To go a step further, I feel that we can also start teaching the students how to analyse movie adaptations and a cross media comparison of the text in novel form and in the movie form. 

A Summary of...

Fifty Shades of Grey 

E. L. James

The controversial fiction follows the perspective of Anastasia Steel, a 21 year-old college senior who finds herself engaged with her interviewee, 27 year-old Christian Grey. Ana encounters Christian while interviewing him in place of her best friend, Kate, who fell ill on that day. Ana is instantly attracted to Christian but also finds him intimidating. They eventually become acquainted when Christian shows up at a hardware store where Ana works and leaves her his phone number. After going for coffee, Christian gave Ana the first edition of Tess of the d'Urbervilles and takes her by surprise. Christian later on makes Ana sign on a piece of non-disclosure agreement and another document before they engage in any sexual activities. He also brings her to his playroom full of BDSM gadgets. Ana and Christian continue to meet up and have sexual engagement with progressively increased intensity as dominant and submissive. Eventually, as the tension mounts between two, Christian shows Ana how extreme a BDSM relationship with him could be and Ana realises how incompatible they are and she returns to the apartment she shares with Kate. 

My Thoughts...

From the outset, it is clear that this would be an inappropriate text to teach at the Secondary school level. At least, the entire text would be inappropriate due to the explicit contents present in the book. However, I brought up this book because I would not have picked it up if not for a course I had to study in Uni using this text. My suggestion is that we could consider using certain portions of the book that is appropriate enough for classroom teaching for the Secondary Four Express classes if we want to expose our students to learning about female agency and the construction of stereotypes and tropes in popular and commercial media. In addition, we could also do an analysis of fan fiction and spinoffs, comparing the text to Twilight, which is the original story that James write a fan fiction for. If the students are studying traditional Victorian novels such as The Scarlet Letter or even Jane Eyre, these contemporary popular chick lit can serve as a good springboard to talk about women writing and to expose our students to the construction of female characters written in, for and from the mainstream perspective (i.e. the expectations of women in society and how the position of women has changed in the years). I feel that this would be a nice breather from the usual racial and socioeconomical issues or even the postcolonial texts that the syllabus insists upon. It might even interest the students more in the meantime that they gain exposure.