Depressed, Discouraged, and Despondent

Authors Note: This is a piece about a quote from the book Speak. In this piece I will explain how this quote explains the conflict in the story and the theme. My quote is: “When people don't express themselves, they die one piece at a time.”

Imagine if you were in eighth grade and you went to a party and got in an inappropriate situation. You then call the cops because the situation scared you. Bad choice; your destined to be a loser in high school because you get blamed for being a party pooper. This event relates to the book Speak, by Laurie Hasle Anderson. Melinda Sordino got into a difficult situation and is depressed over it. There are many reasons why this quote, “When people don't express themselves, they die one piece at a time”, relates to the theme and conflict of the book, Speak.

To begin with, in the book the conflict and the theme are the same thing; high school reputations. So obviously, the conflict is Person vs. Society. The first reason this quote relates to the theme is that this quotes shows what’s happening in Speak. Melinda Sordino got into a conflict at a high school party and now everyone hates her. But they don’t know her side of the story. For her former classmates to know her side of the story although, she needs to speak up. But she doesn’t, she feels like she should keep the secret to herself and let everyone push her around. By doing this, it kills her inside, as the quote says. She needs to stop hiding what happened to her and let it out to the world!

Even though what’s happening in Speak relates to why this quote is similar to the theme of the story, there are other reasons too. Another reason is that Melinda is having problems with her life. She’s cutting class, and went down to a D average student rather than an A+ student. As the quote says, “they die one piece of a time.” , Melinda continues to destroy herself inside because she doesn’t express her feelings. She turned into a depressed girl who doesn’t even know why she comes to school. She needs to stop with the nonsense and get her life back on track.

As you can see, these reasons obviously explain why this quote relates to the Speak. Melinda Sordino is a very strange character with a secret. Will she ever speak up? Or will she keep a hold of her secret forever? You will have to read to find out!