Plaza College 2010 Writing Competition

Winner: 1st place, BBA Division
Winner: 1st place, College-wide Competition

Question: How has studying English changed your life?

By Cynthia Davis 

 

As a young girl growing up, I felt as if literature and English played a major part in my life. Suffering from the loss of my parents and struggling to maintain a normal upbringing in a world filled with so much turbulence, I used the written word as a tool to escape reality. I sat for long periods of time in a corner reading books such as Ramona and Beezus by Beverly Clearly, discovering a new world, a world that, at times wasn’t so different from mine, but a world that had a fairytale ending. As a teenager I began reading certain books like Nancy Drew, Encyclopedia Brown, Babysitters Club, Sweet Valley High, and The Outsiders. These books gave me knowledge of teenagers and introduced the world of mystery to me. I will never forget the book that changed my life and made me want to become a writer. I received the book Are you there, God? It’s me Margaret by the author Judy Blume as a birthday gift.  I read this book, over and over; I couldn’t believe that my thoughts and emotions were embedded in this book, How did Ms. Blume know how I was feeling? After reading that book, I began to write a journal, putting words down on a piece of paper, reflecting my thoughts on my everyday life. I felt that my writing could help others as these books helped me; I wanted to write down all my feelings, and one day, create a book that people could read and understand that they are not alone. I liked reading and loved writing, but I never truly got the meaning and reasoning behind some authors’ thoughts. I wondered; “How did these authors learn to express their thoughts so eloquently?” I had made the choice that I wanted to become a writer, and I wanted to learn everything I needed to know about English.

Studying English changed me as a person as well as a writer; instead of just reading a book for entertainment, I started reading to discover the reasoning behind the words. Why did an author use a certain word instead of another? In high school, we were taught different techniques to write essays, and we studied many different kinds of literature such as novels, plays, and autobiographies. I took writing courses to learn the proper format when writing a novel or essay. I appreciate the knowledge that I learned and walked away feeling that I was on the right path to achieving my dream.

Studying English in college opened me up to a whole new world, a world that involved compare and contrast, argumentative essays, research papers, and revision. I read short stories like “Barn Burning” and “A Rose for Emily” by the author William Falkner. These stories challenged me in ways I never knew a story could. After reading them I felt as if I had gained insight on how authors can express their thoughts in many different ways, not always leaving the answer to a question in plain sight.

You ask, “How has studying English changed my life?” Well, the answer is very simply that it didn’t change me; rather, it made me who I am. English saved and entertained me as a child, intrigued and inspired me as a teenager, and as an adult, English surprised me. I thought I knew all that I needed to know about English and myself, but I was wrong. So, I say “Thank you, English, for creating me.”