Roses in the Desert :: Essays Papers

Roses in the Desert Hearts starve as well as bodies, give us bread, but give us roses! - James Oppenheim, line of â€Å"Bread and Roses,† poem written in 1911, quoting the protest slogans of female industrial workers What brings the human heart to starve? Such a critical question acutely fits into the rhyme and reason of character and theme in Stargirl and Holes. Discerning the meaning of a hungry human heart, against a back drop of parched desert environments, protagonists Leo, Stargirl and Stanley Yelnats walk in worlds fraught with injustice and cutting unkindness. From Mica highschool to Camp Green Lake, authors Jerry Spinelli and Louis Sachar do not shy away from illustrating worlds connected to the industrial jungle which prompted Oppenheim’s 1911 poem; rather, within these American deserts, their protagonists help readers to explore theories of nonconformity, loyalty, and altruism. Through Stanley’s good humor and intermittent kindness in agreeing to teach Zero to read, Leo’s self-conscious perspective as narrator, and Stargirl’s selfless generosity in giving porcupine neck ties and African violets, Sachar and Spinelli question that which starves and that which nourishes our living human hearts. What does it mean to fit in? As creatures designed for community living, we desire to be liked, to be appreciated, and to be included among groups. Leo knows how to fit in; he knows not to be being singled out in the crowd, how to dress, what to say, especially against the flamboyant nonconformity of Stargirl. Stanley also stands out in a crowd, but not by choice; overweight, he doesn’t â€Å"have any friends at home† and â€Å"kids at school often teased him about his size,† and coming from a poor family, he longs to do things that â€Å"just like rich kids† (Sachar 7, 6). His notebook is dropped in the toilet by pint-sized bullies and his family is under a curse. In Stanley, optimistic about â€Å"swimming in a lake† despite his ominous detainment in a detention center, there exists the same good humor and optimism that sustains his inventive father. In revealing Stanley’s smile at their â€Å"family joke† to readers, Sachar shows hi s protagonist’s strength in inherited humor and the strength of his imagination; his family stories feed him and he is lifted out of where he is by the power of his memory. Against ghastly, sweltering conditions and the injustice of his own incarceration, Stanley’s sense of humor saves him from breaking;