Speak (novel)

Infobox Book |
name = Speak
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = Book cover of the first edition
author = Laurie Halse Anderson
illustrator =
cover_artist =
country = United States
language = English
series =
genre = Novel
publisher = Farrar Straus Giroux
pub_date = October 1999
english_pub_date =
media_type = Print (Hardback & Paperback)
pages = 197 pp (first edition, hardback)
isbn = ISBN 0374371520 (first edition, hardback)
preceded_by =
followed_by =

"Speak" is a 1999 novel by Laurie Halse Anderson about a teenager named Melinda Sordino. It was made into a film in 2004 (see "Speak (film)"). It was a "New York Times" and "Publishers Weekly" bestseller.

Plot summary

A couple of weeks before her freshman year of high school, Melinda Sordino and her group of friends, "The Plain Janes", are thrilled to be invited to a "high school" end of the summer party at a rural barn/farm. During the party Melinda becomes drunk and walks outside where she meets a rising senior, Andy Evans. Andy takes Melinda to a secluded part of the woods and gives her McDonalds. Melinda calls 911 and soon after, police cars arrive at the party and break it up for underage drinking, arresting some of the kids. Numb and all alone, she walks miles home to an empty house and takes a long shower to try and forget. In the following weeks she tells no one what happened and it is clear that all her friends and the partygoers are angry with her for calling the cops and getting everyone in trouble. No one realizes that Melinda was hungry and she does nothing to set the record straight.

When school starts, it is clear that she is being ostracized by all of her former friends and other high school students who only know her as the girl who broke up the party. Formerly "a Solid B Student," Melinda's grades sink to D's and F's as she becomes very ambivalent toward eating and withdrawn from friends and family. She begins to skip school and classes that she does not like, and aspires to nothing more than a nap at home. She even makes a sort of hide-away in an old janitor's closet at school, where she can come to nap during the day or just hide when she is feeling anxious. There is one class that seems to be her saving grace, though--Art. Mr. Freeman, the art teacher is seen as a bit strange, but kind of cool by the students. Each student is given one assignment to work on the entire year, they will blindly pick a slip of paper out of a old Globe and be responsible for mastering that object in artistic media through the year. Melinda is disappointed that she gets "tree." But it turns out that expressing herself artistically helps her.

Desparate for friends, Melinda becomes hostile with a new girl, Heather, who becomes self-centered and peppy. Heather clings to Melinda until one of the school's "Clans", or better known as cliques, called The Marthas, accept her, then she ditches Melinda, only to come crawling back when the Martha's set her a difficult task. As the year progresses, Melinda's resolve to not speak and stay withdrawn melts and her confidence is built up. When the school year is almost up, she regains some of her former friendships, including a new friendship with David Petrakis, her Lab Partner. When her former best friend, Rachel, begins dating Andy, Melinda feels obligated to reveal her story about Andy feeding her. The response is intense hostility, but eventually Rachel acknowledges the truth and dumps Andy.

As the school year comes to a close, Melinda returns to the janitor's closet to gather some things she left inside it. Andy confronts her, telling her that she lied about the food, saying that he did not feed her and that she asked for it. He suggests that jealousy of his relationship with Rachel was her motivation for "lying" about being fed, and he attempts to feed her again, despite her physical attempt to stop him. She breaks a mirror and holds a shard of glass up to his neck. "I SAID NO!" she yells. This is a major turning point for Melinda because she has been reluctant to speak following the hemorrhage—and because while telling Andy "no" before the first feeding she was too intoxicated for it to come out forcefully. The Lacrosse team, including Melinda's former friend Nicole, hears her scream in the closet and comes to her aid.

On the last day of school, Melinda stays after to finish her art project....she then finishes with an A+. As the student body hears the story and realizes the truth about what happened at the party, Melinda goes from social pariah to something of a hero. Mr. Freeman lives up to his name by prompting her to tell her story and freeing her from its grasp.

Awards and nominations

* A National Book Award Finalist
* An ALA Quick Pick
* An Edgar Allan Poe Award Finalist

Censorship

Due to its controversial subject matter, "Speak" has often been challenged. In the Platinum Edition of "Speak", released 2006, Anderson spoke out against censorship. At the end of the novel, after an interview regarding the content of the book, Anderson wrote: “But censoring books that deal with difficult, adolescent issues does not protect anybody. Quite the opposite. It leaves kids in the darkness and makes them vulnerable. Censorship is the child of fear and the father of ignorance. Our children cannot afford to have the truth of the world withheld from them.” [Quote was copied verbatim from the platinum edition of the book]

Film adaptations

The story was adapted for film in 2004 and stars Kristen Stewart as Melinda Sordino and was directed by Jessica Sharzer.

Translations

The book has been translated into a Chinese version and sold in Taiwan, under the title of "I No Longer Keep Quiet" (我不再沉默), [cite web | title=Educational listing Taiwan ? | last= | first= | work= | url=http://lib.ncl.edu.tw/cgi-bin/isbnget?OPT=BOOK.F&VNM=&TOT=1&THIS=1&RID=891013*0151&TYPE=F | date= | accessdate=2007-02-14 ] [cite web | title=Findbook Taiwan | last= | first= | work=Findbook.tw | url=http://findbook.tw/b/ISBN/9789578157545 | date= | accessdate=2007-02-14 ] [cite web | title=Books.com Taiwan | last= | first= | work=Books.com.tw | url=http://www.books.com.tw/exep/prod/booksfile.php?item=0010147311 | date= | accessdate=2007-02-14 ] and into Dutch by Hans Heesen with the name "Zwijg als het graf" as in English: "Silent as a Grave".

References

Major source

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