4.2

4.2

Peter Ho Davies, author of “What You Know,” used many different moves in his story about a teacher and his fight. The teacher’s fight is how he can write a story in the eyes of a student, whose name is Clark, that committed homicide as well as suicide. The writing teacher decided the only way he could write this story through Clark’s eyes, was to put himself in Clark’s shoes. The way he did this was by attending a gun range and shooting at a target. The target represented the people Clark shot. What was most difficult for the teacher to comprehend was how Clark shot himself. It just didn’t seem realistic. So the teacher put an empty gun in his mouth to imagine and just couldn’t. Ho Davies tried to create a visual every time the teacher would try something new, and he did it through his writing.
The language Peter Ho Davies used was an interesting choice. It seemed as if he chose it to seem more educated than a student but not extremely difficult to understand to the common world. He also chose very descriptive words that open one’s eyes. Like the word vicious; having it italicized with the meaning behind it just made the story so much more intense. It kept the reader wanting to read. The way he illustrated his swear words was surprising. He didn’t use them in an angry tone, he would use them in common conversation when the teacher would be talking to himself.
The style Ho Davies used was also very appealing. He would submit arguments between the teacher and the students in order for the reader to see what was going on. When one of the students used the word knoll, the teacher then corrected him saying knell. Providing support for his argument the student convinced the teacher that his saying knoll rather than knell was better word usage. They had the class vote, and they voted in favor of the student. The way he would compare things like shooting and video games was different because you would never think to relate the two, but his style made it perfect.
Peter Ho Davies also used wrong forms of words. He would say dear instead of deer, or the escape goat rather than the scapegoat. He insisted on doing this to act as if he were a student writing a fiction story like the students were required to do for the teacher. As the teacher stated on numerous occasions that the students didn’t care because, “The good ones were bad, and the bad ones were tragic.” So he was making it seem as if he were writing as a student rather than as a professional writer.
I specifically liked the way Ho Davies developed the word suicide throughout the entire story. He at first made it seem as if suicide was boring and didn’t do anything in writing, but later had the teacher putting his life into a student’s to figure out how to write the perfect suicide story. So it was at first mere and by the end, it took over the entire story. The way he developed it though was great. He started off as boring, then completely dropped the subject to talk about homicide, then made it seem as if the kid did it so he could write his paper about suicide. It messed with the teacher’s head. He had no idea what to think anymore.
I was not a huge fan of the whole conflict at the shooting range between the teacher and his neighboring shooter. I felt it was unnecessary to mention and a waste of time to both read and write. It put the story as a whole at a stand-still because it had no relevance. It was like a deleted scene in a movie that just didn’t get deleted. It just made the story so much more confusing than it needed to be.
Overall, although I thought the storyline was a little messed up, Peter Ho Davies used some pretty good moves to progress the story along. His language, style, use of wrong forms of words, and development of the word suicide all helped make the story an easy read and easily understandable. On the other hand, with his insertion of the encounter between the teacher and his neighbor, it was very difficult to keep reading and made some parts confusing when they didn’t need to be. Generally, I like the way Peter Ho Davies writes, he just needs to be careful on losing the reader in confusing context.