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English Lessons EV Honors Humanities Class Will End With Five-Day Trip To London

By Marny Lombard marnyl@spokesman.com(509) 927-2166

Tiffany Claridge, author of Chapter Three, agonized over her main character.

“What would cause Lucas to withdraw from his family?” Claridge asked. Should she make his wife’s pregnancy more traumatic? His money problems more severe?

On the other side of the classroom, another student wanted to resurrect dialogue and description for Chapter Five.

“We’ve cut so much out, there’s no storyline there anymore,” Jared Finck told his teacher, Julie Seipp.

It’s not easy writing a novel. The sophomores in Seipp’s honors humanities class at East Valley High School are learning this the hard way. Under deadline.

At the same time, the students are working to raise money for the finale to this difficult course: a five-day trip to London next fall.

Finck won the chance to rework his chapter last week. But it came with conditions.

“You must convene a committee of five people to OK your changes. And I need (the new chapter) at 7:30 tomorrow morning. Clean. No typos,” Seipp said.

Each student is writing a chapter on a novel that covers 300 years of British history. Characters must interlock; ages must fit; descriptions must jibe, from one chapter to the next. The students work in groups of five, editing each others’ writing.

Research they did first semester forms the backbone of their time line. The small groups of students, along with Seipp, examine each chapter for everything from historical accuracy to punctuation.

“And we rewrite, rewrite, rewrite,” Seipp said. “These kids are wonderful.”

“I believe it is a wonderful way to write and learn,” said Charlyn Johnson, who wrote the prologue and first chapter. “You know it’s going to be published, you try a little harder.”

Other students agree that their peers helped in the writing process.

“I’ve learned that other people can help. That it doesn’t always have to be my ideas,” Claridge said.

“It was really hard making everything mesh,” said Daphne Wilmschen, who was working with Claridge on her fine-tuning.

Claridge interrupted the session.

“I have to go take a biology test, but I’ll be back,” she told Wilmschen.

After rewrites galore, the first four chapters of the students’ historical novel made it to the printer last week.

Chapter Five didn’t make its deadline, after all.

“We’re stuck on Five,” Seipp said. Finck brought in his reworked chapter on time, but his main characters had become a bit nasty. “They were less benevolent than Chad (Sharvet) needs them to be in the next chapter.”

Seipp sent Finck and Sharvet home for the weekend, with orders to work out the confusion.

Chapter 18 underwent its first rewrite last week. By now the novel has characters in England, India and Hong Kong. And by today, chapters five through 10 should be at the printers.

Orders for hardback copies had to be made last week. Seipp wavered: Should they order 40 or 50 in hardback? She decided on 50.

Softback copies would be ordered later, to serve as textbooks for next year’s class. The focus for next year’s honors humanities is Paris. Already, enough students have signed up for two sections of the class. Seipp seems a bit overwhelmed at the prospect.

Then, there’s the fund-raising and organizing of this fall’s tour of London. Each student must earn $1,300, and progress has been slow.

“If I had $500, I would think I’d died and gone to heaven,” Seipp admitted.

The students have put on car washes, they’re selling T-shirts with a snappy Shakespeare pun, and they’re planning on capitalizing on Mother’s Day with a plant sale at Taco Bell, as well as other fund-raisers.

Meanwhile, Johnson knows amazing things about the Great Fire of London. As author of Chapter One, she researched the historic fire of 1666 and Samuel Pepys, whose diary covered the years 1660-1669.

“There were well over 100 churches in London at the time of the fire. Many of them had lead roofs. The heat from the fire was so great that the lead melted and ran through the streets,” Johnson said.

Some of her classmates might say Johnson is one of the lucky ones. Now that her group’s chapters are done, she’s free to help other groups.

And, as long as this ambitious group has a little energy left over, Johnson and some others are studying for the AP history test. They’ll take it Friday.

The AP test has not been a major focus of this class this year.

But, after 300 years of history and with a novel in the works, these sophomores aren’t afraid of anything.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 Photos (1 Color)

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: The Black Death gives life to prose This excerpt from the prologue and first chapter of the novel is the work of East Valley High School sophomore Charlyn Johnson, edited by her classmates and teacher Julie Seipp: Death lurked in every infested alley and haunted every foul slum. It slunk though the rancid mud creeping into the homes and hearts of families. It spared neither rich nor poor and infected all who crossed its path. Suffering suffocated London of 1665 and gorged itself on the helpless citizens’ lives. The prophetic purple tokens that appeared on the bodies of victims, foretelling disease, lent the pestilence its dreaded title: Black Death. The Neal family was snagged in the snarled, lethal web of the plague. The family was imprisoned in its dark home under the watchful eyes of guards, who were sent to the tainted houses to isolate the inhabitants and halt the infestation. They were trapped alone with the disease to live or die. Isaac Neal could only look on helplessly as his wife, Sara, succumbed to the illness, her once spirited and cheerful flame of life quelled by the savage malady. The pain pinching Sara’s face was mirrored in the features of their children, Esther and Lucas, as they watched their loving mother perish. The cart that came around the city at dusk to collect the bodies of the dead was soon to come for their mother. Grief over his wife’s death melted into fiery anger in Isaac’s breast. Why did someone so good have to endure an end fit only for the most dreadful sinner? Fury at the fixed guards, the city and King Charles II, who had abandoned England in the wake of the plague, transformed Isaac into a silent, brooding man. But the passage of time and the voiceless pleas etched in the pained faces of Esther and Lucas - begging him to return to the caring father he had been - began to wash away his rage, leaving a residue of numbness. His children needed him. One year later another tragedy stuck. Igniting in the gloom of a bakery on Pudding Lane, its flames began to snatch at the filth, purging the city of pest and pestilence. The Great Fire of 1666 was finding root in London, greedily reaching for all there was to claim. The charred remnants of the city, framed by the rising sun, pierced the London sky and provided a skeletal reminder of the scorching fury of the past days. A subdued silence wavered over the blackened ruins, inscribing itself into the memories of two small shadowy onlookers. As the sun continued its path higher into the heavens, its light kissed the faces of the children, igniting in them a flame of warmth and comfort that only a new day, free of the pain of yesterday, could bring. They stood side by side, their forms buried beneath layers of tattered clothing, their thin bodies wrapped in a ragged blanket their father had snatched from the hungry water of the Thames. They had not had time to save any of their own possessions. Huddled in their tiny home with their father, they had lingered - waiting and hoping - until the flames began to lick at the walls and thatched roof. The children shivered in the chill September air. They could visualize the smoke rising over the city, blossoming into an ominous black flower that blotted out the sun. The children jumped as they each felt a large hand rest on their narrow shoulders. Their father spoke. “Esther, Lucas.” His throat, dry and parched, lent the words a harsh, hoarse ring. “We, we don’t … We don’t have a home…” he said gently. Esther nodded. “I know. We know,” she whispered, tightly gripping her small brother’s hand. Lucas only stared blankly, his blue eyes wide and round. “Where will we go?” Esther asked, shattering the quiet. Their father was silent. All they had left now was an empty feeling of pain to take away with them. But to take where? They had nothing, no one, save God, to turn to. “We’ll go to a church.”

This sidebar appeared with the story: The Black Death gives life to prose This excerpt from the prologue and first chapter of the novel is the work of East Valley High School sophomore Charlyn Johnson, edited by her classmates and teacher Julie Seipp: Death lurked in every infested alley and haunted every foul slum. It slunk though the rancid mud creeping into the homes and hearts of families. It spared neither rich nor poor and infected all who crossed its path. Suffering suffocated London of 1665 and gorged itself on the helpless citizens’ lives. The prophetic purple tokens that appeared on the bodies of victims, foretelling disease, lent the pestilence its dreaded title: Black Death. The Neal family was snagged in the snarled, lethal web of the plague. The family was imprisoned in its dark home under the watchful eyes of guards, who were sent to the tainted houses to isolate the inhabitants and halt the infestation. They were trapped alone with the disease to live or die. Isaac Neal could only look on helplessly as his wife, Sara, succumbed to the illness, her once spirited and cheerful flame of life quelled by the savage malady. The pain pinching Sara’s face was mirrored in the features of their children, Esther and Lucas, as they watched their loving mother perish. The cart that came around the city at dusk to collect the bodies of the dead was soon to come for their mother. Grief over his wife’s death melted into fiery anger in Isaac’s breast. Why did someone so good have to endure an end fit only for the most dreadful sinner? Fury at the fixed guards, the city and King Charles II, who had abandoned England in the wake of the plague, transformed Isaac into a silent, brooding man. But the passage of time and the voiceless pleas etched in the pained faces of Esther and Lucas - begging him to return to the caring father he had been - began to wash away his rage, leaving a residue of numbness. His children needed him. One year later another tragedy stuck. Igniting in the gloom of a bakery on Pudding Lane, its flames began to snatch at the filth, purging the city of pest and pestilence. The Great Fire of 1666 was finding root in London, greedily reaching for all there was to claim. The charred remnants of the city, framed by the rising sun, pierced the London sky and provided a skeletal reminder of the scorching fury of the past days. A subdued silence wavered over the blackened ruins, inscribing itself into the memories of two small shadowy onlookers. As the sun continued its path higher into the heavens, its light kissed the faces of the children, igniting in them a flame of warmth and comfort that only a new day, free of the pain of yesterday, could bring. They stood side by side, their forms buried beneath layers of tattered clothing, their thin bodies wrapped in a ragged blanket their father had snatched from the hungry water of the Thames. They had not had time to save any of their own possessions. Huddled in their tiny home with their father, they had lingered - waiting and hoping - until the flames began to lick at the walls and thatched roof. The children shivered in the chill September air. They could visualize the smoke rising over the city, blossoming into an ominous black flower that blotted out the sun. The children jumped as they each felt a large hand rest on their narrow shoulders. Their father spoke. “Esther, Lucas.” His throat, dry and parched, lent the words a harsh, hoarse ring. “We, we don’t … We don’t have a home…” he said gently. Esther nodded. “I know. We know,” she whispered, tightly gripping her small brother’s hand. Lucas only stared blankly, his blue eyes wide and round. “Where will we go?” Esther asked, shattering the quiet. Their father was silent. All they had left now was an empty feeling of pain to take away with them. But to take where? They had nothing, no one, save God, to turn to. “We’ll go to a church.”