With Their Eyes: September 11th -- The View from a High School at Ground Zero
Annie Thoms, Taresh Batra (Editor), Taresh Batra (Created by), Anna BelcBooks.org participates in affiliate programs including Bookshop.org and the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made through links on this page, at no additional cost to you.
Overview
I could have died that day.
September 11, 2001
Monologues from Stuyvesant High School
Tuesday, September 11, started off like any other day at Stuyvesant High School, located only a few blocks away from the World Trade Center. The semester was just beginning, and the students, faculty, and staff were ready to begin a new year.
But within a few hours on that Tuesday morning, they would all share an experience that transformed their lives.
Now, on the tenth anniversary of September 11th, we remember those who were lost and those who were forced to witness this tragedy. Here, in their own words, are the firsthand stories of a day we will never forget.
Synopsis
September 11, 2001Monologues from Stuyvesant High School
Tuesday, September 11, seemed like any other day at Stuyvesant High School, only a few blocks away from the World Trade Center. The semester was just beginning, and the students, faculty, and staff were ready to start a new year.
Within a few hours that Tuesday morning, they would experience an event that transformed all their lives completely.
Here, in their own words, are the firsthand stories of a day none of us will ever forget.
Publishers Weekly
Thoms, an English teacher at Stuyvesant High School, located four blocks from the site of the World Trade Center, spearheaded a school production last February based on 10 students' recorded interviews (with classmates, faculty and staff members). The students converted the transcripts into "poem-monologues," which they presented and the text of which appears here. In Thoms's introduction, she notes that the goal was "to capture the ways individual people express themselves in speech," and, indeed, the collective impression is one of a group therapy session that may well provide some healing for teen readers still struggling with the event's aftermath. Many of the monologues (at times laced with "um" and "like") probably work better in a dramatization; on the page, the narratives at times falter and a few repeat similar themes. The poignant "Precious Cargo," for instance, begins with a photograph of a student performing as a pregnant English teacher, and her words of protectiveness about both her unborn child and her students read well on the page, but would likely be even more moving onstage. Still, the emotional rhythms of the volume take on a credible ebb and flow. A welcome dash of humor comes through in a freshman's contention that the students' relocation to Brooklyn Tech (while their school functioned as a triage center) put everyone on equal footing ("Everybody was like/ `Where the hell are my classes?'/ so it was kinda like everybody was a freshman"). In the closing entry, perhaps the most smoothly structured in the volume, the school theater manager recalls returning to a newly reopened Stuyvesant to find the flag missing from the stage. Later, he "came across a picture/ of firemen/ installing a flag/ on the mast of the World Trade Center/ and I looked at the picture and my jaw dropped./ It was our flag." Readers willing to overlook less relevant and revealing segments will find a number of moving moments here. Ages 13-up. (Sept.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble ReviewNew York City's Stuyvesant High School stands within sight of the World Trade Center, and on September 11, 2001, it quickly became the concern of many Americans and world citizens. As a window into this school's experiences surrounding that tragic day, a group of creative acting students from Stuyvesant have assembled this stunning collection of monologues -- originally performed on stage, now in print form -- to unite the memories and emotions of its students and employees.
Under the direction of English teacher Annie Thoms, who provided the helpful introduction to this book, the student members of the Stuyvesant Theater Company began this project about 9/11, "in which Stuyvesant students were able to tell their own stories, and the stories of others in our community." The actors talked with fellow students, teachers, assistant principals, dining hall workers, and custodians, taking careful note of each person's physical mannerisms and verbal patterns. After all the pieces were assembled and a stage was created, the actors performed "with their eyes" in February 2002 -- each student played the person he or she had interviewed, surmounting differences in age, ethnicity, or gender -- to audiences who responded with standing ovations. This book, then, is the series of monologues the students performed, along with photos from the production, a foreword from actress and playwright Anna Deavere Smith, a chronology of Stuyvesant High School events on 9/11, and extra notes on the production and staging.
Both moving and engrossing, With Their Eyes will touch all readers looking to connect with their own memories about 9/11 or seeking realistic insight into the minds of students who experienced that day firsthand. Young readers will be motivated to document their own stories or feelings about September 11th, while parents and teachers can launch meaningful discussions at home, at book groups, or in the classroom. A powerful work that steers clear of "being cheesy or maudlin," this impressive work captures voices that teach and inspire. Matt Warner
Booklist
"The speakers reveal their emotions with a painful honesty that’s profound, and the startling immediacy of the words gives these pieces even more impact. An obvious choice for reader’s theater and for use across the curriculum; its deeply affecting contents will also make compelling personal-interest reading."Publishers Weekly
Thoms, an English teacher at Stuyvesant High School, located four blocks from the site of the World Trade Center, spearheaded a school production last February based on 10 students' recorded interviews (with classmates, faculty and staff members). The students converted the transcripts into "poem-monologues," which they presented and the text of which appears here. In Thoms's introduction, she notes that the goal was "to capture the ways individual people express themselves in speech," and, indeed, the collective impression is one of a group therapy session that may well provide some healing for teen readers still struggling with the event's aftermath. Many of the monologues (at times laced with "um" and "like") probably work better in a dramatization; on the page, the narratives at times falter and a few repeat similar themes. The poignant "Precious Cargo," for instance, begins with a photograph of a student performing as a pregnant English teacher, and her words of protectiveness about both her unborn child and her students read well on the page, but would likely be even more moving onstage. Still, the emotional rhythms of the volume take on a credible ebb and flow. A welcome dash of humor comes through in a freshman's contention that the students' relocation to Brooklyn Tech (while their school functioned as a triage center) put everyone on equal footing ("Everybody was like/ `Where the hell are my classes?'/ so it was kinda like everybody was a freshman"). In the closing entry, perhaps the most smoothly structured in the volume, the school theater manager recalls returning to a newly reopened Stuyvesant to find the flag missing from the stage. Later, he "came across a picture/ of firemen/ installing a flag/ on the mast of the World Trade Center/ and I looked at the picture and my jaw dropped./ It was our flag." Readers willing to overlook less relevant and revealing segments will find a number of moving moments here. Ages 13-up. (Sept.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.From The Critics
New York City's Stuyvesant High School was on the front lines the morning of September 11, 2001. As faculty and students watched, the nearby Twin Towers tumbled into dust. Relocated while their school was used for the rescue mission, the students in Annie Thoms's English class tried to decipher the event's effect on their school community. Fitted with tape recorders, the students sought out students, faculty and staff and interviewed them about their experiences on and after September 11. They transcribed each interview, selecting twenty-five to turn into a two-act play, with students portraying their interviewees through dress, gesture and speech patterns. The play was performed on February 8 and 9, 2002, at Stuyvesant High. Thoms's students have created a unique art form, part oral history, part drama, that depicts the wide range of emotions and reactions experienced by those in the inner rings of ground zero. This text can be a resource for producing the play, but also for other teachers to use in constructing a multigenre project. Powerful and poignant, With Their Eyes is testament to the power of writing. 2002, HarperTempest, 228 pp.,— Michele Winship