Davis+LENS3+True+Notebooks

Response to True Notebooks: Intertextual True Notebooks is an interesting text in that it employs journaling and memoir aspects to create a novel. It is also important to note that although there is one constant protagonist, Mark, we get to hear several different voices throughout. It is almost as though this book has several different authors collaborating on one project. Because these kids are in a prison setting, they often write about what got them there and how they feel in their situation. I think it would be beneficial to use this text in conjunction with other texts and even different media. I especially think it would be effective to use television shows such as //Lockdown// and //America’s Hardest Prisons// as a supplement to this text, especially any episodes that had a focus on juvenile detention. These programs show the daily lives of inmates. The shows often focus on a few particular individuals and tell their story. I think this similarity with the book would be an effective way to show another side to how the boys are characterized in the text.

In the book, the boys move from this image of flat characters as just criminals but they quickly become real people through their writing. We see much about their lives and their families. But for the most part we see them through the lens of Mark and the writing class. These television shows have a similar focus on humanizing the inmates that are interviewed. But in the shows we see them in the prison setting, moving through different daily aspects of prison life.

I belief this would be beneficial with discussing these character in depth. First, this might be a more accessible avenue for student who had difficult with the text. Watching a show with similar content to the book could entice them to be more active in conversations. Secondly, this added material would be simple to present. A class could watch and episode or fragments of several in only one class period and discuss it. Most importantly though, I think this would add a level of understanding to the boys situation. These shows would allow students to actually see what the boys in the novel were actually facing each day. This might influence students’ interpretations of why the boys write how they do and about the topics they choose. I think it would be important to get students to think on a broader level when it comes to prison life and how it affects an individual’s personality.