A CONTRY BOY QUITS SCHOOL

BY:LAO HSIANG

CHINA

SUMMARY:  It is about a poor Chinese family which is forced to send its boy to school following an official proclamation, ignoring which would mean a jail term. ... The boy is finally pulled out of the school.

LEARNING: If they will push you to study. Do it for your future. Because education is the sword of life

SILK

ALESSANDRO

ITALY

SUMMARY:  The story of a married silkworm merchant-turned-smuggler in 19th century France traveling to Japan for his town's supply of silkworms after a disease wipes out their African supply. ... He succeeds, makes fortune and is invited to travel again to trade silkworm eggs in a longer journey to Japan.

LEARNING: Silk is a powerful and erotic tale that reveals how one's man desire threatens to ruin his life. It is 1861 and Hervé Joncour is a silk breeder from France who is happily married to the beautiful Helene.

MALINCHE

LAURA ESQUIVEL

MEXICO

SUMMARY:  Laura Esquivel reimagines the relationship between the Spaniard Hernán Cortés and the Indian woman Malinalli, his interpreter and mistress during his conquest of the Aztecs. ... Throughout Mexican history, Malinalli has been reviled for her betrayal of the Indian people.

LEARNING:  As humans, we are the best creation of God for we are gifted with intellect, free will and most of all, the ability of speaking to express ourselves.

SEVEN AGES OF MAN

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

ENGLAND

SUMMARY: The speech compares the world to a stage and life to a play, and catalogues the seven stages of a man's life, sometimes referred to as the Seven Ages of Man: infant, schoolboy, lover, soldier, justice, pantaloon and old age, facing imminent death. It is one of Shakespeare's most frequently-quoted passages.

LEARNING: "The Seven Ages of Man" from "As You Like it" by William Shakespeare is very motivating, specially about life, because it inspires you to give importance to life, it helps you to understand the life more deeper, and it can help you to be you as a human being living here in Earth and be an inspiration to others.

A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUN

KHALLED HOSSEINI

AFGHANISTHAN

SUMMARY: A Thousand Splendid Suns is a gripping tale of two young women, Mariam and Laila, and their difficult lives together, married to the same husband, Rasheed. The women form a close bond during these miserable circumstances, and come to care for each other deeply.

LEARNING: One could not count the moons that shimmer on her roofs. And the thousand splendid suns that hide behind her walls."

SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY LIKE THE NIGHT

LORD BYRON

ENGLAND

SUMMARY: The poem is about an unnamed woman. She's really quite striking, and the speaker compares her to lots of beautiful, but dark, things, like "night" and "starry skies." The second stanza continues to use the contrast between light and dark, day and night, to describe her beauty.

LEARNING: Convey her beauty as a harmonious "meeting" between darkness and light. After its discussion of physical attractiveness, the poem then portrays this outer beauty as representative of inner goodness and virtue.

THE VALLEY OF AMAZEMENT

AMY TAN

AMERICA

SUMMARY: The Valley of Amazement is a beautiful story of separation, hope, and love between a mother and daughter. ... As a boy, Loyalty had visited the courtesan house in which Violet lived with her mother. He was badly scratched by Violet's cat. Loyalty buys Violet's virginity, and Violet fantasizes he'll marry her.

LEARNING

:  This story teaches us to be confident, love and accept ourselves of who we are. Many persons will be ashamed and shy of how they look, move, speak, and etc. and are insecure of their “unique” features. Because we are unique, we must be “who we are” And also, loving and accepting ourselves first is the main priority before others will love and accept you also.

CORALINE

NEIL GAIMAN

ENGLAND

SUMMARY: . I call it "delightfully scary" becaus while it grips the reader's attention with creepy happenings that may cause a case of the shivers, it is not the kind of scary book that leads to nightmares of the "it could happen to me" kind. The story revolves around the very strange experiences Coraline has when she and her parents move into an apartment in an old house. 

LEARNING: I liked this novel for the most part because it was out of the ordinary. It's not like anything i've ever read and I really appreciated that aspect. However, one thing that really bothered me was how Coraline's family treated her.

TELEPHONE CONVERSATION

WOLE SAYINKA

SOUTH AFRICA

SUMMARY: Telephone Conversation" is a 1963 poem by the Nigerian writer Wole Soyinka that satires racism. The poem describes a phone call between a landlady and the speaker, who is black, about renting an apartment. ... You can read the full text of “Telephone Conversation” here.

LEARNING: This poem shows us the conversation of two people in a phone talking such a business deal on that make ...

THE BOY NAMED CROW

HARUKI MURAKAMI

JAPAN

SUMMARY: The boy named crow. Kafka on the Shore is structured around the alternating stories of Kafka Tamura, a fifteen-year-old boy who runs away from home to escape an awful oedipal prophecy, and Nakata, an aging and illiterate simpleton who has never completely recovered from a wartime affliction.

LEARNING"And once the storm is over, you won't remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won't even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is for certain.