African Imperialism: Creative Historians
Project Reflection
The assignment was simple, or at least it sounded that way. Write about an African country of your choosing. Sounds fun! I'll rewrite The Lion King! Nope. We started by studying imperialism in Africa. Basically, Europe comes in and divvies the place up. Africa for everyone! Except for it's original inhabitants, unless they mind their manners. This affected my initial plan significantly. Then, we picked a country. I chose Morocco. In 2006, my godfather traveled to Morocco. The pictures he brought back echoed within my mind. At the time, I wanted to go to Morocco, but being a small child, that wasn't likely to happen. With this in my mind, I wrote my story.
I feel that my main literary strength was keeping my characters human and feasible. Too often when I write fiction my characters become clear-cut good guys or bad guys. In this instance, I was able to keep them relatively morally gray. I feel this helps the story pack more of a punch, as, because of their humanity, you feel something, but because of the grayness, you're not sure whether or not you're feeling what you should. It generates the uncertainty, the difficulty, which the story is about.
"Hassan
He was lost. The gunfire was mostly over now. Where was his father? Shouldn’t he be on his way back by now? He ran to the kitchen, and grabbed a knife off the cutting board. He stood in the shadow of the doorway, holding it tightly. He saw two French, or as he saw them, enemies, walking towards him. He knew that he must protect his family. He counted down from ten. When he reached zero, he would run out there, and defend his family. He would be a good son.
Abel
The officer had chosen to follow him! How much better could things get? The officer walked ahead of him, saying something about wanting to inspect the architecture and way of life here, so he could put it in his report. Abel nodded, and kept a wary eye out for anything that could jeopardize this opportunity of his. As the officer stepped down the alleyway, a glint caught Abel’s eye. A knife, flashing. In one smooth motion, Abel managed to bring his rifle to his shoulder, and fire a single, deadly accurate shot."
The biggest difficulty I had with my story was incorporating my research, the "historical integration", as it were. So, I attempted to open myself up to the time period by just working in little details, as opposed to big chunks of quotes. Just minor things, name drops here and there, to make it work properly.
I made two major revisions to my story. The first was setting. It was originally going to be about the Roman colonization of Morocco. This later changed to the French invasion and colonization of Morocco, which was a little bit more accessible in terms of good records. The other major change to it was deciding to tell the story of just the immediate characters. I mostly ignored surroundings and scenery, in order to tell a good story. I wanted the story to be the driving part of my piece.
I completed a challenge extension (which is the sophomore equivalent of advanced "honors" curriculum at Animas) for this project. I told the story from two different perspectives, and I used several literary devices. This was an enjoyable process, as I was intending to use the dual perspective anyway, so it didn't really require me to revamp my story drastically. The literary devices I used were simple things like alliteration and other nifty little eye-catching word tricks. The excerpt below, again, demonstrates this effectively.
"Abel
Abel was having another very good day. The siege of Rabat had been a quick, and a relatively efficient thing. The big guns did their job, and he did his. He could still see down the sights of his Lebel, working the bolt as the next figure rushed towards him. That figure dropped, and he kept firing. Back, forward, pull trigger, repeat. Back, forward, pull trigger, repeat.
He stopped only when there was nothing moving. He lowered the rifle, and walked forward with his squad. Another town captured, another victory, another chance for promotion. He’d heard a rumor that they were thinking about commending him on merit, and merit alone, for an officership. Next stop: Fez. He figured he’d make a good impression.
Hassan
They’d stayed. He didn’t quite know why, but they remained behind. He’d seen many of the others taking up arms to defend Fez. He decided he’d join them. He ran to get a knife from his father, who stopped him. “Hassan, you are too young. I need you to stay here, and watch after your family.”
“Yes, Sakhr.”
“Good lad. I’ll be right back.” Hassan smiled and waved, certain that they both would be able to protect their family until it was over."
You can look all this over in the attached story below. Also attached is my art piece, which was read aloud in a "dramatic reading" sort of fashion.
Photos in document courtesy of Anthony Vail Sloan.
Special permissions granted.
I feel that my main literary strength was keeping my characters human and feasible. Too often when I write fiction my characters become clear-cut good guys or bad guys. In this instance, I was able to keep them relatively morally gray. I feel this helps the story pack more of a punch, as, because of their humanity, you feel something, but because of the grayness, you're not sure whether or not you're feeling what you should. It generates the uncertainty, the difficulty, which the story is about.
"Hassan
He was lost. The gunfire was mostly over now. Where was his father? Shouldn’t he be on his way back by now? He ran to the kitchen, and grabbed a knife off the cutting board. He stood in the shadow of the doorway, holding it tightly. He saw two French, or as he saw them, enemies, walking towards him. He knew that he must protect his family. He counted down from ten. When he reached zero, he would run out there, and defend his family. He would be a good son.
Abel
The officer had chosen to follow him! How much better could things get? The officer walked ahead of him, saying something about wanting to inspect the architecture and way of life here, so he could put it in his report. Abel nodded, and kept a wary eye out for anything that could jeopardize this opportunity of his. As the officer stepped down the alleyway, a glint caught Abel’s eye. A knife, flashing. In one smooth motion, Abel managed to bring his rifle to his shoulder, and fire a single, deadly accurate shot."
The biggest difficulty I had with my story was incorporating my research, the "historical integration", as it were. So, I attempted to open myself up to the time period by just working in little details, as opposed to big chunks of quotes. Just minor things, name drops here and there, to make it work properly.
I made two major revisions to my story. The first was setting. It was originally going to be about the Roman colonization of Morocco. This later changed to the French invasion and colonization of Morocco, which was a little bit more accessible in terms of good records. The other major change to it was deciding to tell the story of just the immediate characters. I mostly ignored surroundings and scenery, in order to tell a good story. I wanted the story to be the driving part of my piece.
I completed a challenge extension (which is the sophomore equivalent of advanced "honors" curriculum at Animas) for this project. I told the story from two different perspectives, and I used several literary devices. This was an enjoyable process, as I was intending to use the dual perspective anyway, so it didn't really require me to revamp my story drastically. The literary devices I used were simple things like alliteration and other nifty little eye-catching word tricks. The excerpt below, again, demonstrates this effectively.
"Abel
Abel was having another very good day. The siege of Rabat had been a quick, and a relatively efficient thing. The big guns did their job, and he did his. He could still see down the sights of his Lebel, working the bolt as the next figure rushed towards him. That figure dropped, and he kept firing. Back, forward, pull trigger, repeat. Back, forward, pull trigger, repeat.
He stopped only when there was nothing moving. He lowered the rifle, and walked forward with his squad. Another town captured, another victory, another chance for promotion. He’d heard a rumor that they were thinking about commending him on merit, and merit alone, for an officership. Next stop: Fez. He figured he’d make a good impression.
Hassan
They’d stayed. He didn’t quite know why, but they remained behind. He’d seen many of the others taking up arms to defend Fez. He decided he’d join them. He ran to get a knife from his father, who stopped him. “Hassan, you are too young. I need you to stay here, and watch after your family.”
“Yes, Sakhr.”
“Good lad. I’ll be right back.” Hassan smiled and waved, certain that they both would be able to protect their family until it was over."
You can look all this over in the attached story below. Also attached is my art piece, which was read aloud in a "dramatic reading" sort of fashion.
Photos in document courtesy of Anthony Vail Sloan.
Special permissions granted.