Einstein’s Tongue–Are We Confuzzled Yet?
A short college essay, written for AP Language. I haven’t gotten a grademark for this yet, but I think it’s kinda fun, maybe something a little memorable. Hopefully a good college essay. The teacher asked our class to choose one of a few topics from the Common Application to respond. Well, here is mine.
A writer needs to love their protagonist! At such a level this character may even be a writer’s greatest influence, more so than any character of another story. This is what I say, anyway. Ken Koitsu throws life into my face and kicks me back down into the dirt more times than any other character in fiction (based on an admittedly limited range of reading). Although he is no replacement for a true “existing” teacher, can I let him be the source of my chief influence? He beats most of the people in my life for the label “Epic Man,” or other titles to represent a high tier of awesomeness.
He’s coined a few terms, and for the sake of possible humor, I present two: the boy-giggle to replace the chuckle and combat the general theory that boys don’t giggle; and confuzzle, a synonym to confuse, though with a more physical connotation regarding the dazed, “fuzzy” feeling one gets when struggling through dense material. And although these may (or may not, to allow subjective thoughts) seem giggle-worthy and cute, Ken Koitsu isn’t all cotton and fur and fluff, and certainly no teddy bear!
Like every motivated character, he’s had a fair share of misfortune in his past though, because he has every wish to keep from ruining good moods, he has demanded that I omit his background. Doing so has unfortunately shortened what I had in mind, but I have to respect his wish or some trouble might ensue involving several shreds of paper littering the ground, an empty trash bin on the computer, and a second, less personally interesting topic.
All’s well that ends well then; Ken’s reputation spreads, and everything appears relatively unharmed.
Drew aka Einstein will be 17 next month and is a junior in high school. When he
was a freshmen living in Michigan, a friend introduced him to a story he had in mind and the
two started developing it. Drew now lives in Virginia but he and his friend have
continued the writing and illustrating collaboration long distance by phone and email.
They look forward to the day when Ken Koitsu, a soldier and mentor, will see the light of publication.
November 5, 2010
Posted in: Einstein's Tongue
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4 Responses
Good Work.
This piece has some original thinking and the writing is well done. I like the idea of a story protagonist being your teacher.
Originality and the creativity of a good potential writer. I look forward to more of your work, Drew.
I’m a little confuzzled, but would certainly love to learn more about Ken when he comes to light on the page. I’m picturing kind of a young Jack Reacher…but that can’t be right. Reacher would *never* boy-giggle.
Nice post!
Oh wow, thank you all for this multitude of responses! Far more so than I could ever have expected, lemme say that. It really is a sigh of relief to hear some of these things from you dear readers.
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