Letter of Introduction

Past:

High School
In high school, I read quite a few books for school. Well, actually, for most of them it was I should say I "read" them (meaning Spark Notes was my friend). I struggled through A Picture of Dorian Gray because it was too slow for too long, so by the time it got into the exciting bits, I had already resorted to Sparky to finish it.

However, one book I was required to read for class I thoroughly enjoyed and have moved on to another book because of it. The book wasn't for English, it was for math and is over 100 years old, Flatland. The book was completed in 1884 Edwin Abbott Abbott, a school teacher. It focused on two points:

1. Satirically attacked the practices of the Victorian England.
2. Put out thoughts about higher spatial dimensions.

I am now reading Hyperspace by Michio Kaku.

My most fond books however have nothing at all to do with math or science. The series that most affected me throughout my secondary education was pretty much the exact opposite of science. It followed story of a group of teenagers who were seemingly growing as I was, of similar age throughout the entire series. They experienced similar troubles in school as I did, except with a few unique to them. The story of Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Ron Weasley is not just a simple children's tale. It is much more than that, it was (and is) the start of a whole culture that I am happy to be apart of.

Beyond these tales I read the short stories of James Thurber, my favorite American author, with his unique and humorous takes on ancient proverbs. I also followed the adventure of a certain Arthur Dent throughout the galaxy in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and its "Trilogy of Five" along with Douglas Adams other detective type novel with humor throughout. I also read most of the Ancient Myths of Greece during my high school years. I spent sometime studying the bible and the differences in translations. I've also read books about Hinduism and Buddhism and plan to read more in the coming years, because they are intensely interesting religions (Buddhism is much for philosophical then religious).


College
As a Freshman, I've only been through one semester so far. So little has been done so far. However, my first English teacher, a Mr. Anthony Collamati, was probably one of the best teachers I'd ever had. His unique teaching style really entrenched in me ideas about writing and reading and expression of ideas in general. Our final project included a remix video. Within that video, I had to chop up several different audio tracks all about completely different subjects into one singular theme, the one I wanted to put across.

Since my senior year of high school, I have been writing music and expanding the way I think about transmitting my thoughts to others. Struggling through metaphors, leitwortstil, and twists to go beyond the obvious truth.

Present:

Reasons for Taking this Course

• It satisfies the Literary English Requirement for graduation
• Never been a fan of structure-writing courses
• Prefer 20th and 21st Century lit over previous centuries because it is much easier to identify with the author.

Mark Todd