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Moreover, how does each type of guilt affect the characters differently? Which kind has a more lasting impression? Additionally, the role Steve's race plays in how he is perceived by the jury can lead to an in-depth discussion about prejudice and discrimination. As they read, students should note which characters are guilty and in what manner. Myers subtly draws a distinction between legal guilt and moral guilt through the actions and emotional state of each character involved in the trial. The core themes of this novel address justice, institutional racism, deception, guilt, and the effects of peer pressure. A teenager named Steve Harmon finds himself on trial, facing the death penalty, for being the "lookout" during what turned out to be a lethal burglary. Highly recommended.Sometimes, a small choice has monstrous consequences, and there's no better example of this predicament than the story told in Walter Dean Myers's award-winning novel Monster. This is a great novel for the classroom, but I think adult readers would also enjoy it.
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This psychological/ethical/perceptual dilemma dominates the novel and Myers is content to let moments of irresolution stand in place of easy, platitudinous answers or dogmatic moralizing. At the heart of the novel is Steve’s inward battle to see himself as human and resist the gaze of the prosecutor, jury, and judge, as well as his attempt to escape the way that jail will shape his personality. The students generally love it–they get to read the parts in Steve’s film–and it provides a fantastic platform to discuss a number of relevant issues, including justice, prejudice, guilt and innocence, and how we perceive (and sometimes dehumanize) others.
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I’ve used this novel in my 10th grade classroom for a few years now and it’s always a big hit (this year we’re reading it in conjunction with Antigone and a viewing of Lumet’s 12 Angry Men). Although Myers always has his teen audience in mind, he never talks down to them, and even though Monster features a discussion of some “edgy” content (uh…prison rape) it’s always purposeful to the narrative and never lurid or used for the sake of crude shock value. Hinton, Robert Cormier, and Judy Blume), and Monster is written to appeal to high school kids. Walter Dean Myers ( Scorpions, Fallen Angels) is one of the founding writers of the YA movement that emerged in the early seventies (other writers include S.E. These handwritten passages introspectively contextualize the rest of the narrative, which is composed of Steve’s screenplay of the events of the trial. To avoid the intensity of his situation, he writes a diary where he records his feeling. Steve, a sensitive kid from a stable home, despises the violence and cruelty of jail and feels utterly alienated from the reality of his trial.
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Before he wound up in jail, Steve attended Stuyvesant High School, where he excelled in his film class. In fact, he didn’t even send a signal of any kind, he just walked out of the store. Only Steve wasn’t in the store at the time of the robbery/murder–he was playing the role of the lookout. He participated in a robbery that went bad when the store owner was killed with his own gun.
THE BOOK MONSTER WALTER DEAN MYERS TRIAL
In Walter Dean Myer’s Monster, sixteen year-old Steve Harmon is on trial for felony murder in New York City.