Voice In Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak

Superior Essays
As Michael Morpurgo once said, “Encouraging young people to believe in themselves and find their own voice whether it’s through writing, drama, or art is so important in giving young people a sense of self worth.” In the book Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, Melinda Sordino feels that her voice is taken away after being raped by Andy Evans which he is referred to as IT, and Andy Beast. She goes into high school as a young teen, depressed and silenced. Melinda grows stronger throughout her freshman year as she struggles to find her voice again. When she is going through the process of trying to put the pieces together of what really happened the night she went to the party and got drunk, Ivy, helps her understand that there's hope of finding her voice through expressing herself in …show more content…
Melinda struggles to find her voice again while forgiving for what happened to her, expressing herself in a way that her art has given her the answers that she has been looking for all along, all she needed was a little encouragement, faith, and hope.

Melinda starts off high school with no friends and the entire high school body despising her existence. She struggles to speak and find her voice as she replays the tragic night; Andy Evans raped her at the party after she had been drinking. As she struggles to speak to anyone about the incident, she says “It's easier not to say anything. Shut your trap, button your lip, can it. All that crap you hear on TV about communication and expressing feelings is a lie. Nobody really wants to hear what you have to say.” (Anderson 9). Nobody really knows the truth about why she called the cops the night of the party, but judge her for crashing it and leaving before the cops got

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Speak essay Speak is a story that follows a high school Freshman, named Melinda Sordino, as she goes through the five stages of grief. The reason she goes through the five stages of grief, is because she was raped at the beginning of her 9th grade year at a high school party. She was bullied for calling the cops on the guy who raped her at this party. Even though, the people didn't understand why she called them. Though she was harassed at school, her problems at home were just as bad.…

    • 701 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Melinda Sordino

    • 863 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Ever since the incident occurred at the summer party, Melinda has certainly discovered a few positive, defining characteristics of herself. She has definitely grown from being temporarily defined as timorous and fearful of speaking up into a courageous, passionate teenager. Throughout the entire story every defining trait of hers are represented by the symbol of trees and more specifically, her drawing of a tree in Mr. Freeman’s art class is her own proof of her journey to discover her true identity, and her emotional recovery.…

    • 863 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    If you ask any woman on the planet, they have likely experienced sexism--it could be objectification, assault, or harassment. Melinda Sordino is no exception. The narrative, Speak, written by Laurie Halse Anderson, follows Melinda through her first year of high school after being raped the summer previous. Exploring topics such as sexual assault, everyday sexism, relationships between women, and the lack of power given to women, Speak is a text that defines and highlights the experiences of women in the face of such obstacles. Through a critical feminist approach, the prose epitomizes the negative effects of patriarchy upon girls and women.…

    • 600 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Melinda she can't really talk to them about her problems in her life. At the end of the first part of the book, Melinda’s problem are causing her to not going to class. In Speak, the author shows that Melinda should talk about her problems Reading…

    • 143 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    "I hate you," she mouths silently.” (Halse Anderson 7). When Melinda decided to call the cops, because she was raped by IT, and broke up the party, she instantly became one of the most hated people in her school. This took a huge toll on her because, again, she had no support. No one to lean on, or tell everything.…

    • 850 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Melinda’s at a high school party, where Melinda gets raped by Andy Evans, a high school senior student attending at the same school as Melinda. Melinda’s got frightened so she called the police. Melinda’s first year of high school is a ruin where it seems like everyone hates her now. Melinda doesn’t speak up and tell them why she called the police; she’s too afraid and ashamed…

    • 212 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the novel, Melinda did not know that she can be brave and confident enough to talk and shout for help. She does not know that she is capable of fighting back, yet in the end, she realized she fought back and shouted for help. It shows us that she just have to be strong and start to speak up because if she wasn’t strong and loud nobody could have heard her and she was raped again by Andy Evans. We should believe in ourselves and be strong because if we won’t we might just be in trouble or people won’t know what our backstory…

    • 839 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Quotes Courage In Speak

    • 877 Words
    • 4 Pages

    However, she had run away like a coward and never spoke up about what happened, instead she let everyone hate her; soon, she became the school's outcast. Unable to find her voice to speak up, Melinda Sordino faces…

    • 877 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Teens usually have low mental strength. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson is about Melinda Sordino, an outcast who called the cops at a summer party. In Speak, Anderson demonstrates how survival takes a lot of mental strength when Melinda is bullied, loses a friend, and being bothered by her rapist. Speak shows how survival takes a lot of mental strength when Melinda is bullied. She is being bullied by the Basketball Pole at lunch and: “Thwap!…

    • 407 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    She used to be popular, until what happened to her, which made her shut down. During her freshman year of high school, Melinda was much of a outsider more than anything. She wasn’t very liked because of what she did as a result of Andy raping her, which was calling the police. All of the kids made fun and teased Melinda, they never bothered to ask her what happened to her. Melinda had a moment where she made a new friend, and was slightly on track of becoming popular again.…

    • 811 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Melinda Sordino busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops. Now her old friends won’t talk to her, and people she doesn’t even know hate her from a distance. The safest place to be is alone, inside her own head. But even that’s not safe. Because there’s something she’s trying not to think about, something about the night of the party that, if she let it in, would blow her carefully constructed disguise to smithereens.…

    • 99 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The ice in her throat keeping her mute had finally melted and she opened up to one of the teachers at her school about how she was raped. Melinda is finally gone from her past and moved on. She realizes that it was not her fault that she was raped. Melinda starts the school year off unable to speak due to the ice in her throat, but as the school year goes by, the ice slowly melts freeing her voice and letting her speak to people to solve the problem that she is…

    • 926 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Shame is a painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior. The behavior that causes someone to feel shame can either be made by a major on minor mistake. For hundreds of years people have felt the weight of shame and the consequences that follow it. In the contemporary novel: Speak and in the classic novel: The Scarlet Letter this in one of the main issues that the main characters have to go through and overcome.…

    • 1083 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    During a face-to-face interaction, identifying and understanding the various methods of communication is crucial to decoding the emotional complexities of the conversation. Take for example the meeting that occurred between Lieutenant Olivia Benson and her son’s teacher, Mrs. Smiley, on the TV show Law and Order: SVU. The meeting took place to discuss a bruise found on the arm of Benson’s son, Noah. This seemingly normal parent-teacher conversation took a turn early on when Mrs. Smiley revealed that Noah had told the school nurse that Benson caused the bruise on his arm; creating tension throughout the rest of the meeting. The communication codes used during this interaction help to display the effects that these codes have on real life conversation.…

    • 1735 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the book, when Melinda is remembering what happened that night, the text states, “I’m mumbling like a deranged drunk. His lips lock on mine and I can’t say anything,” (135). The alcohol in Melinda’s system caused her to create unstable decisions such as wandering out into the woods at night without adult supervision or at least a responsible friend. It also barred her from speaking her mind and telling Andy Evans how she felt. When Melinda is…

    • 546 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays