【101-1 第三名】應外三 張〇誠：Before I Go to Sleep

Before I Go to Sleep

參賽者：張〇誠（應外三）
名次：第三名
書名：Before I Go to Sleep
得獎作品：

     The author divided the whole novel into 3 parts: Today, Journal, and Today. At the beginning of this fiction, Christine woke up and knows nothing, including her name, identity, and all her own memory. The only thing she could pick up was that she was 20 or so, but actually she was almost 50 already. Then, she realized she was now sleeping with an unknown guy, who then claimed that he was Ben and her husband as well. Later, he told her about how they first met and their wedding. After handing Christine a scrapbook containing some so-called memory between him and her, he went out for work. With uncertainty, she browsed through the book. Later, a ringing sound filled the room. A man whose name was Dr. Nash called, claiming that he and Christine had been meeting about the disease for a couple of weeks. The most important thing he told her was that under the shoebox in the closet lay a journal that Christine had been keeping for weeks. The first part of this novel ended with an appalling sentence: Don’t trust Ben! Then part two of the novel began; in other words, the journal that Christine Lucas had been keeping will lead readers, and the memory-lost protagonist, onto the path to gradually discover the thrilling trauma of herself. In the last two parts of the novel, Christine gradually found out some inconsistencies between what Ben told her and what she discovered herself. Therefore, she decided to trust only herself, started a journal, and relied on her own way to discover the hidden world.

     There are two main reasons for me to admire this book. First, I assumed the use of first person point of view was remarkable. As mentioned above, the second part of the novel is Christine’s daily journal. Just like reading our own journal, I read Christine’s and the images of the setting emerged as if I was experiencing the story written in words by myself. Simply because of this, when I was skimming through the journal, it seemed that I were Christine herself. It felt like that I was with Christine to feel happiness and sadness, to doubt what she heard, to explore the unknown past. Second, the novel also provided a penetrating insight to the anxiety and struggle of a sufferer from memory loss. For Christine, her own world was not managed by herself. However, it was built based on others’ statements. However, for everyday new Christine, those who claimed themselves as secret doctor, intimate friend, or even lovers are no more than strangers. It is undeniably difficult for her to trust all they said. She was like a drowning swimmer, while those who were still in touch with her are her only reliance. She thought of running away; tragically, she could not even do this because tomorrow she would wake up and remember nothing. The depiction of the frightened mood was not only outstanding but remarkable.

     This novel began with a line from Parviz Owsia, “I was born tomorrow/ today I live/yesterday killed me.” This line, or poem, perfectly described the hardship that Christine suffered. For her, tomorrow was a brand-new life, for she could not remember anything. The life she could really handle was only today. The yesterday her was already killed as long as yesterday passed. This novel, as far as I am concerned, is a total success because its plot was well-organized and aroused readers impulse to keep turning the pages. In my opinion, the author simply figured out a brilliant theme of a novel. Christine, a mid-aged woman, still thought of herself as a young lady. The huge memory void successfully created conflict, which made this novel thrilling and exciting. Certainly, memory loss is one of the most cliché plots in soap operas. Yet, the use of first person point of view was brilliant enough to support the whole book. The depiction of fear and helplessness in this book was beyond description. A book of detailed depiction of humanity will be marvelous. This book is the one.

【101-1 第二名】應外三 江〇涵：The Reader

The Reader

參賽者：江〇涵（應外三）
名次：第二名
書名：The Reader
得獎作品：

     A short but breathtaking story with inspiring and meaningful subjects: The Reader. Michael, a little boy haunted by illness, madly fell in love with Hanna, who was almost twice of his age. Not until Michael found out that Hanna loved him reading to her did their relationship deepened. Their love, passion, and desire bonded the secret affair. Reading, showering, and making love had become their meeting ritual. However, one day, Hanna left without any clues.

     Next time when Michael saw Hanna, who was accused of murder, was in a court. The reunion was hard for both of them. For Hanna, she was about to be discovered a long-hidden truth: she was illiteracy. For Michael, he was pulled himself into a dilemma between different views of justice which determined whether he could save Hanna or not.

     The book gave me the feeling that the relationship between one and the other was so volatile and vulnerable, but the opportunity to shorten and tense each relationship was in our hand. In the first glance, Michael and Hanna seemed to build up enough trust and dependence so that they never tried to intervene in or intended to gain the power to control each other’s private life. To a certain level, they were perfect match and the love was transcendent and impeccable. However, Hanna’s leaving changed everything. Originally, Hanna was a misanthropic woman because she was illiteracy, which caused a sense of inferiority to her. This negative self-image isolated her from the world, and finally made her an outsider in the society. Neither did she easily believe in people nor did she get enough security. As a result, she seldom told Michael her past, her family, even what she thought in mind because she was not familiar with trusting people. Once she gave people recognition, she would be so anxious that the person would betray her. That was the reason why she got so angry when she woke up but could not find Michael in the morning. The same thing can also be seen in Michael himself who experienced a difficult time to accept Hanna’s leaving. That healing process turned Michael into a defensive and sensitive person. He neither trusted Hanna nor himself anymore. When Hanna backed to his life, he supposed to be happy but it turned out to be retreated. On the one hand, he had not forgiven Hanna’s unsolicited leave and he was not sure whether Hanna still loved him or not. On the other hand, he was afraid of not being able to make Hanna happy so that Hanna would unhesitatingly leave him like the previous time. The confusion and uncertainty finally led Michael to the path of escaping form Hanna. Actually, the main reason that caused the tragedy was Hanna’s sense of inferiority. Because of illiteracy, she cannot receive higher education. Because of illiteracy, she can only find a job requiring no reading and writing skills. Because of illiteracy, she was unwilling to be labeled as lower class and be discriminated by the society. Therefore, with strong sense of inferiority, she regarded illiteracy as a shame. To protect her dignity, she would rather commit to a crime she was not supposed to be responsible for than tell the truth. Honestly, I admired Hanna’s courage to protect what she valued the most, dignity, but I did not agree the way she saw herself. I believed that discrimination is formed by both sides: Hanna and others. In other words, although other people probably despise Hanna, if she did not see herself that way, discrimination did not exist at all. We cannot control how people judge us, but we can decide the way we see ourselves.

     The story also raised another issue: justice. Hanna worked as a guard in the concentration camp, when WW ǁ finally came to an end, she was charged with murdering the Jews. Germans who did not join Nazi’s massacre blamed those who worked for Nazi of cruelty, lack of humanity, and even deserving imprisonment. Hanna, unfortunately, was the pathetic sacrifice after the war. Actually, the Jews, the victims, probably had the right to fight for justice from Nazi, but others did not. Ironically, the post-war German society was the opposite way. The minority could not speak out for themselves; instead, the main accusers of Nazi’s crime just were those Germans who were not the members of Nazi. However, did they entitle to blame others? In the critical time, how many of them had tried to stop the slaughter, how many of them had tried to save the Jews regardless of their own safety? If they acted like bystanders and did not try to offer help, what was the difference between them and the Nazi? What they both did was looking people dying without offering help. In other words, people who should be responsible for the tragedy were not only the Nazi, but also those who had the opportunities to do something yet chose not to. Justice is hard to define or strike a balance satisfying both sides. Be aware that when we criticize others, do we do the same thing as theirs?

     I learned two lessons from the book: First, the importance of learning to believe, to love, and to forgive. Instead of tormented by the past, we have to learn how to let go at the right time. Second, do not criticize people until you make sure that you are not responsible for the outcome. With the tangled but appealing plot, The Reader undoubtedly depicts human nature directly and realistically. The nature shared by all human beings when it comes to love and separation. It will be the book I would like to read all over again.

【101-1 第一名】財法四 施〇輝：The Pearl

The Pearl

參賽者：施〇輝（財法四）
名次：第一名
書名：The Pearl
得獎作品：

        ‘The Pearl’ is a heartfelt story written by John Ernest Steinbeck who wrote it soon after his overnight success with ‘The Grapes of Wrath’. The Pearl reveals how people in poverty struggled to stay alive, especially after the discrimination that Steinbeck witnessed against the Mexican people in the 1940s. This is a story that portrayed how greed can devour a man.

        Kino was a young pearl diver who led a simple life with his wife Juana and son Coyotito in La Paz. He loved his family and remained faithful to the traditions of his village and his people. One day, Coyotito was stung by a scorpion while sleeping on his bed. However, the mercenary town doctor refused to treat the baby because Kino could not pay the exorbitant treatment fees.  That day, Kino went diving and obtained a great pearl. Both Kino and Juana thought that their prayers were answered as they would be able pay the doctor to treat their son. News travelled quickly about the pearl and many people in the town plotted to steal the pearl from Kino. While the townspeople plotted against Kino, he dreamt of marrying Juana in a church, buying a rifle, and sending Coyotito to school so that he could learn to read. Kino believed that an education will free his son from the poverty and ignorance that have oppressed their people for more than four hundred years.

        The doctor came to treat Coyotito when he learnt of Kino's pearl, and even though Coyotito was already healed by Juana's remedy, the doctor took advantage of Kino's ignorance and convinced him that Coyotito would die without the care of a doctor. The doctor tried to con Kino into revealing the place he hid pearl. The doctor is an important character in The Pearl because he represents the colonial attitudes that oppressed Kino’s people for years. The doctor symbolizes the colonists’ greed and arrogance towards the natives. Like the other colonists, the doctor displayed no interest in Kino’s people. His warped values made him there simply only to make money out Kino. As a physician, the doctor is duty-bound to save lives, but when faced with someone whom he considered as status that is beneath him, the doctor felt no obligation at all. His unsympathetic refusal to treat Coyotito for the scorpion sting simply because Kino did not have the money to pay him exhibit the human costs of political conquest embedded in the desire for financial profit.

        Greed contaminates their once simple way of life. When Kino tried to sell the pearl in town for fifty thousand pesos the dealers only wished to pay one thousand for, the pearl buyers tried means to convince Kino that the great pearl he found was worthless because it was too large. Kino made the decision not to sell the pearl and intended to travel to another city to sell the pearl at a fair price. His brother, Tom Juan, felt Kino was foolish because it defied his usual way of life and placed his family in great danger.

        Juana warned Kino that the pearl was evil and would destroy the family, but he refused to throw it away because it was an opportunity to provide a different life for his family. That night, Juana tried to throw the pearl into the sea, but Kino managed to stop her in time and gave her a beating. From a simple and contented man, Kino became aggressive against people who showed interest in the pearl and the tragic break from the family he longed to support. The pearl finally led Kino into corruption, and he slit a man's throat who attempted to steal the pearl from him.

        Eventually, the price of the pearl was higher than anyone could imagine. It was paid in the price with the cold blood of Coyotito. While they were travelling to another town, Kino discovered trackers following them. He knew that they would steal the pearl and kill his family. Kino and Juana took the baby and hid in a cave at nightfall. Kino sneaked down in the night to kill the trackers but before he could attack them, Coyotito gave a loud cry. The trackers thought that it was a coyote and shot at the dark cave where Juana and Coyotito hid. As the shot was fired, Kino attacked the trackers and killed them all. Unfortunately, Coyotito was already killed by the first gunshot and Kino's journey with the pearl ended in a tragedy. Filled with redemption and sorrow, Kino and Juana decided to return home and get rid of the trouble source. They returned to La Paz and threw the pearl back to the ocean.

        Steinbeck has written a parable about how wealth and greed may deplete innocence and bring evil into our lives. With his expressive and beautiful writing style, he brought the story to life.

        In the beginning of the story, Kino is a simple man who is essentially contented with his lot in life. However, Coyotito’s scorpion sting and discovery of the great pearl opened Kino’s eyes to a larger world. The portrayal of Kino’s character is a gradual decline from a state of innocence to a state of corruption and delusion. The forces propelling this decline are desires and greed in human. In the story, Juana symbolizes wisdom and common sense. She supports Kino’s dreams and idealism but was vigilant and guarded against the pearl’s temptations. Juana was at first seduced by the luxury that the pearl will bring for them, but she recognized the pearl was a potential threat as Kino’s character changed and their family might be broken up because of it. Contrary to Kino, Juana believed that their lives would be better if they maintained things as they were. Kino could only see what they can gain from the pearl, but Juana understood they were on the losing end. Juana’s presence in the story capped Kino’s enthusiasm and serves as a warning to the readers that Kino’s desire to make money was dangerous. Kino’s brother represents the voice of reason and caution. He recognized the fact that they must not show too much ambition or else everything good will be torn from them.

        In a story that is less than a hundred pages, Steinbeck managed to captivate the readers and empathized deeply with the characters. Readers are lured into turning the pages knowing that an impending disaster awaits Kino and his family as the pearl starts to devour Kino’s soul. The story is considered as a classic because it portrays ideas that are common to all people. In this world, everyone has greed and the desire to become wealthy. Steinbeck made use of simple music like the song of family, the song of evil, the song of the pearl to create a surreal story. The Pearl displayed an exploration of how good motives can bring a person to a bad end.

【100-2 第三名】財法一 洪〇凡：The Help

The Help

參賽者：洪〇凡（財法一）
名次：第三名
書名：The Help
得獎作品：

     The Help depicted the south life in America in 1960s.The blacks were crippled by the chains of discrimination. As servants, they hadn’t been treated as normal people. Instead, they’d been put scorn on, bullied, even killed without reason. With no help, they could only silently sustain hardship in numerous events. Though I knew that misery from textbooks, somehow I just couldn’t feel the same way. That is, what I knew was the history. However, through this book, I felt the words’ real, jumping out of the pages, and then visualized in front of me. The stories in the book are colorful and lifelike, making me touched. Because of it, I could imagine all miseries of mankind that they’d suffered. To be more exact, I comprehended what tribulations they had been to be subjected to. In the book, a white girl, Skeeter Phelan, who was a green hand of the society, irritated by an abominable means by her friend who reckoned that blacks were all dirty and contagious so prohibiting them from using whites’ restrooms. This made Skeeter felt revolted and then due to this, she determined to write the stories from those who worked for whites, and were treated badly. What she’d done was a pioneering work. I admire her anti-unfairness deeds, but I admire those who were brave enough to dictate their own stories to Skeeter much more. There was so much unpredictable danger in their future life. Once their identities were discovered, they could be fired or even worse; that is, losing their lives. But they chose to stand out, speaking loud, stunned the world. But for their fearlessness, the ugly fact couldn’t have been disclosed, been spread out, and been to urge the society to face it seriously. Stories of theirs are poor, making me filled with righteous indignation. After reading, I made a self-examination: All of us knew everyone’s equal, and we should be kind to everyone without prejudice. But did we put it into practice actually? If our nation weren’t disadvantaged in international relations, would we look down on the Third World? Is it a distorted prejudice that we pursue the western culture, longing for a blond-hair beauty from there but not a black-hair one from the Southeast? There is so much to list, and to meditate on. However, besides from the serious parts, I’d like to share one funny, somewhat cheerful story in the book. One servant, after being under a long-term awful treatment in her hirer’s villa, was driven beyond the limits of forbearance. She put her own shit in the pie for her hirer! What’s more, she told her hirer while her hirer was enjoying it! Though it wasn’t a correct method for children to learn, it was the greatest one I had heard of as revenge. To me, she could be a sort of heroine! Not only did she dare to do, but she dared to admit her deed. That is awesome! In the age of multiculture and cosmopolitan, we seem to take a giant step towards peace. However, with the tides of fashion and strong individualism, there is an obscure side inside people’s heart. We all talk glibly about that all men are created equal. But it seems to me that all of us are just the echoes. On the one hand, we know the truth; on the other hand, we have our own rule of standards subtly in the mind. That’s really evil, isn’t it? No one discloses the ugly truth so we hide it as usual. Once somebody committs an error, the society must send troops to punish him/her as if others were emissaries of justice. There’s no so-called equality of all time in this world; not to mention the situation between different ancestries. This book made me think of Dr. King, who devoted himself to leading Africa-American Civil Rights Movement. One part of his speech seared into my memory entirely: I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with it’s vicious racists, with it’s governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. Didn’t anyone remember his agitating words? How could we lose sight of our geniueness deeply rooted in the heart? As a matter of fact, there can certainly be no doubt that we can make the things right as long as we face up to the reality and are willing to try. We’re all the residents on the planet. I wonder what would be left if we don’t care about the harmony? Maybe the coldness would be left, the hatred would ramble, and the spring would never come back for good. I’m sure that no one would like something like this to come true. So, Dr. King did it. Skeeter did it. They succeeded. Dr. King can, Skeeter can, so can we! Perhaps we can’t have such influence on this as they did, we can try as much as we can. The aforementioned instances inspired me, and I can tell them to others, changing other’s thoughts if they kept incorrect ideas towards that. Last but not least, The Help is a great book worth reading. We can have tears and laughter together while reading. This is a book full of ruthlessness and warmness. We can find the initial feelings which hided inside the soul, feeling the waves of the mood surging over the mind, pondering long and deeply over the matter. Sincerely, I hope that everyone can read it and really enjoy it.

【100-2 第二名】應外四 張〇儀：Disgrace

Disgrace

參賽者： 張〇儀（應外四）
名次：第二名
書名：Disgrace
得獎作品：

     This is a story of disgrace in post-apartheid South Africa, written by J.M. Coetzee. David Lurie, a Cape Town professor of English, loses everything after having an affair with his own student, Melanie. There is a hearing to help him save his jeopardized reputation and job, but David Lurie is arrogant enough and not willing to accept the deal offered by the committee. He has been assailed by the public; as a result, his reputation sinks out of sight and his job is gone. However, David Lurie himself, dissatisfied with his own lectures to unwilling students, does not seem to care that much. Having caught in a mess, David escapes from his disgrace in the city and moves to his daughter’s farm in Eastern Cape, taking refuge. David’s daughter Lucy, a solid woman and a lesbian, is now leading her life perfectly well in the countryside, seemingly. There is Lucy’s neighbor Petrus, a hardworking farmer, who is black. Although David Lurie thinks at first that Petrus seems to know his place, in time it becomes clear that Petrus wants Lucy’s land and Lucy as one of his wives. Later, an attack is launched against Lucy, raped and impregnated, and David, violently assaulted. Surprisingly, Lucy does not seek for justice and sanction imposed on the rapists, who are also black. Not until then does David Lurie realize the difference already occurred in post-apartheid South Africa. At first, I think Melanie is a victim of David Lurie because his affection, if there is, is obviously not appreciated. David occupies a position of power, a professor, and that is why Melanie does not resist. While they are having sex, Melanie is passive throughout. “All she does is avert herself: avert her lips, avert her eyes,” and “she goes slack, dies within herself for the duration.” We can easily tell how undesired the whole duration is. But then, Melanie starts to know how to take advantage of David, of her own unfortunate. As for David, I don’t think he is a victim of Melanie. From his attitude on the hearing, obviously he does not care about what Melanie says to the committee or how she reacts toward their closeness. He accepts them all. Also, he has made it clear to the committee that he is not sorry and he won’t repent. So, it seems to me that David is the victim of his own desire, something he cannot control, instead of his student Melanie. Animals in the novel are served as the inferior ones, probably black South Africans during apartheid, the colored like Melanie, and now people like David Lurie. At first, David has no sympathy/empathy for the dogs. To some extent, he identifies the animals as black South Africans, the inferior kind: when David finds out the black boy who is peeping at Lucy, he calls him “swine”; also, David thinks what the rapists do is nothing but mating, “marking Lucy like a dog’s urine.” But later he takes on the job as a dog man because he doesn’t want the dogs to bear such disgrace, so I believe it is because he identifies himself as the same kind with them, and there is no such a thing called baas en Klaas (boss and worker in Afrikaans) between him and the dogs. “Perhaps that is what I must learn to accept. To start at ground level. With nothing. Not with nothing but. With nothing. No cards, no weapons, no property, no rights, no dignity. Like a dog. Yes, like a dog.” He himself has actually become the inferior kind now. The reason why Lucy does not seek for justice is confusing. David once says, “Perhaps it was not they who produced her: perhaps history had the larger share.” This is probably the foreshadowing about Lucy’s attitude toward what happens followed. According to David, Lucy “wishes to humble herself before history,” “a history of wrong.” It could be apartheid. Lucy herself also says, “I don't want to come back in another existence as a dog or a pig and have to live as dogs or pigs live under us.” She wants to make up for black South Africans for what white people has put them through, so she moves to the village and befriend them, subordinating herself out of her own will. In short, she compromises. While David is unbending, it is too hard for him to accept how the society has changed after apartheid. For example, he doesn’t understand why Petrus can just walk in his daughter’s house and act like he is their same kind. However, I do think David has changed by the end of the novel. This is post-apartheid South Africa. People must accept or adapt, and David does. He surrenders to the past; his sympathy/empathy for the animals grows, and he is learning how to compromise. And I believe that is his transformation, his changes.

【100-2 第一名】企管四A 林〇昇：127 Hours

127 Hours

參賽者：林〇昇（企管四A）
名次：第一名
書名：127 Hours
得獎作品：

     Imagine that you were trapped down in a 150-yard canyon alone with two burritos, less than a liter of water, a cheap imitation of a Leatherman brand multi-tool, a small first aid kit, a video camera, a digital camera and rock climbing gear, and an 800-pound boulder crushed on your hand. Aron Lee Ralston, a graduate from Cherry Creek High School in Greenwood Village, Colorado and a mechanical engineering and French student at Carnegie Mellon University. At Carnegie Mellon, he served as a Resident Assistant, studied abroad, and was an active intramural sports participant. He left his job as a mechanical engineer with Intel in 2002 to climb all of Colorado's "fourteeners", or peaks over 14,000 feet high during the winter season. In April 2003, Ralston entered Utah's Bluejohn Canyon only to become trapped when an 800-pound boulder shifted, crushed his hand, and pinned him to the canyon wall. For six days, Ralston struggled to free himself while warding off dehydration and hypothermia. Trapped and facing certain death, Ralston chose a final option that later made him an international sensation: Using a multi-tool, the climber amputated his right arm, and then rappelled to freedom. Very few of us will ever have to make the difficult choices Aron Ralston faced. Even fewer of us will experience being trapped underneath a boulder and be forced to serve our own limb over freedom. It is not difficult to believe that Aron Ralston could be any one of us. When his arm got stuck “between a rock and a hard place” (the title of his book and possibly the first time that expression was meant literally), he tried, in vain, to free himself. After a few days of fruitless effort, Aron’s situation only grew more desperate. He began to reflect, “What a big hero! Coming out here without telling anyone where I was going... Mistake! As the ordeal continued, Ralston began to get delirious. Death seemed to hover him. In a true act of desperation, he took a knife, already dulled from repeated banging on the rock, and cut off his arm. Keep in mind that he still needed to scale down the mountain and hike an additional 16 miles. But as he walked away from the scene, he looked back at Blue John and said, “Thank you.” We are given no further explanation but since the mountain released him when his life was endangered, rather than taking it, we must assume he means “thank you for the experience, for the wisdom gained, the lesson proffered." When we are in the midst of trials and tribulations, we are mostly in survival mode, just putting one foot in front of the other and trying to make it through. But when they are over, if we can find a quiet moment, if we can reflect, perhaps we can discover there was something to learn. There is some way to deepen our understanding of ourselves and our potential. As long as we remain alert and receptive, we may be able to overcome and have a chance for reflection. Aron Ralston endured an ordeal that seems incomprehensible to most of us. It took tremendous courage and determination and strength of will to escape the mountain trap. And given his weakened state, even after all that, his survival was nothing short of miraculous. What a tragedy it would have been if the entire trauma had been for naught. But Aron Ralston is a fortunate young man – not just because he survived, but because he recognized the lessons available for him to learn from this experience while he still had the time and ability to change. Although he continues to climb mountains, he also works as a motivational speaker, doing the best possible thing with such dearly-earned wisdom – sharing it with others. Married with a child, he no longer avoids solitude and he never goes mountain climbing without telling someone where he is going. I don’t know how he survived those 127 hours (the 2 hours spend watching the movie were enough of a harrowing ordeal for me) but that really taught me a great lesson as his determination and courage cheated an opportunity for the Grim Reaper. I have grown, even if it’s something so simple as carrying a better blade while canyoneering, from Aron’s experiences. And I hope his wisdom will help you overcome your own mountain, great or small.