Richard Rodriguez
"It mattered that education was changing me. It never ceased to matter. My brother and sisters would giggle at our mother's mispronounced words. They'd correct her gently. My mother laughed girlishly one night, trying not to pronounce sheep as ship. From a distance I listened sullenly. From that distance, pretending not to notice on another occasion, I saw my father looking at the title pages of my library books. That was the scene on my mind when I walked home with a fourth-grade companion and heard him say that his parents read to him every night. (A strange sounding book-Winnie the Pooh.) Immediately, I wanted to know, what is it like?" My companion, however, thought I wanted to know about the plot of the book. Another day, my mother surprised me by asking for a "nice" book to read. "Something not too hard you think I might like." Carefully I chose one, Willa Cather's My 'Antonia. But when, several weeks later, I happened to see it next to her bed unread except for the first few pages, I was furious and suddenly wanted
In another part of this paragraph Rodriquez remembers when his mother asked him for a "nice" book to read. She said "Something not too hard you think I might like." When he gives her a book, weeks later it is found "unread lying next to her bed." It makes him "furious" that his mother would not or could not read this book to the point were he actually wanted to "cry." This and the fact that he placed the book in it's place "alphabetically on my shelf," shows us what kind of love or even obsession he has with his book. It seems as though Rodriquez felt hurt by the fact that someone did not take the chance to read. As seen in this paragraph of Richard Rodriguez's autobiographical essay "Achievement of Desire", he looks back on his childhood remembering his family, friends, and himself. Although, he can only recall feeling anger and sadness at the fact that his parents were poorly educated. His feelings are first seen when he listens sullenly to his mother try and pronounce the word sheep correctly. It seems like he is angered at the not only h
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 713
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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