Independent Reeding

As I discussed in my analytical paragraph last week, much of Stephen King's The Green Mile focuses on the story of John Coffey, a death row inmate. Before he arrives at the prison, Paul and his colleagues talk a lot about Coffey. Standing almost seven-foot-tall and two hundred fifty pounds, it is no surprise that Coffey is the center of discussion and speculation. Through his research, Paul found out that after raping two girls, Coffey had killed them by smashing their heads together with his bare hands. Although Paul had not met Coffey yet, he made the assumption Coffey was as aggressive and dangerous as it gets. In fact, while discussing with colleagues, Paul compared him to a gorilla. When Coffee first arrives at the prison, however, Paul is shocked to learn about his true personality. The first thing that Coffey asks Paul is, "Do you leave a light on after bedtime?" He explains that he "gets a little scared in the dark sometimes" (King 19). Paul had po...

This morning I began reading The Green Mile by Stephen King. I read Carrie a few years ago, and I really enjoyed it, so I figured that I would try another Stephen King novel. The Green Mile tells the story of Paul Edgecomb, a death row supervisor at a Louisiana prison in 1932. While Paul includes experiences from many different inmates that are on death row, of the sixty pages that I have read so far, the book is primarily about an inmate named John Coffey. Coffey, a six-foot, eight-inch, two hundred fifty pound man raped and murdered two young girls. There are many components of the story that are creepy, such as very detailed descriptions of the young girls' bleeding corpses. One of the things that I found even creepier, however, is how blasé Paul is to the events happening around him. While Paul is discussing the events of the crime, he begins to comment on families from the same town.  He mentions that he "knew their families; most of them had sent Sparky a meal fro...

The Alchemist  by Paulo Coelho is the story of a young Spanish shepherd named Santiago who goes on a prolonged journey to fulfill his Personal Legend, one's spiritual destiny or purpose. During his journey, Santiago learns numerous life lessons. While Santiago learned many of the lessons from the words of others, he learned most of them through his experiences and by observing nature and human behavior. Below is the Ten Commandments of the Personal Legend, a compilation of the top ten most important life lessons that resonated with me.  The Ten Commandments of the Personal Legend I - Trust the Impossible "They (children) are not afraid to dream, and to yearn for everything they would like to see happen to them in their lives. But as time passes, a mysterious force begins to convince them that it will be impossible for them to realize their Personal Legend" (Coelho 24). If someone has the confidence to believe in the impossible, the impossible will become thei...