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The Boys in the Boat Essay
Daniel Brown’s The Boys in the Boat is a book that shows2 the strength of the University of Washington’s crew team. The book teaches many valuable lessons from life in the 1930’s. This piece of literature is based on the interviews, which went on for seven years. Joe Rantz, the star of the crew team, was abandoned by his father and step mom, for the second time at age 17. He eventually found comfort in the Olympic bound crew team. Joe Rantz went through many hardships when he was by himself, as well as the intense team workouts, the following quotes exemplify how Joe channeled his energy to be a great crew teammate, that could trust and be trusted by his teammates.
Joe grew up with his step mother and father, He lived with them like normal until the age 10, when he was temporarily kicked out of the house. At the time young Joe missed home but it was not the worst experience for him. When he turned 17 years old his parents left him in a uncompleted house and moved to another state with Joe’s brothers. Joe found it extremely difficult to carry on all by
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himself, but found it even more difficult to be able to trust anyone after that. The quote “Joe and the boys have finally forged the prize they had sought all season, the prize Joe had sought nearly all his life. Now he felt whole. He was ready to go home.” - Brown 355, refers to an earlier statement of how Joe couldn't do anything more to win at Grünau, but have trust in the boys in front and behind him. The team won the race, but Joe more importantly won the ability to have absolute trust and rely on his teammates. The Washington crew team coached by Al Ulbrickson shaped how Joe lived the rest of his life. Crew is a sport that requires, a intense connection with your team. The boat will spin or rock out of control, if everyone isn't in unison. The boys needed to have a deep emotional and trustworthy relationship. After several months Joe and his team were very successful in connecting, as shown in this quote “The Washington boys were rowing as if in a kind of trance now, somehow detached from themselves yet keenly aware of one another's every minute motion” - Brown 269. The crew team, through trust was able to work together and stay synchronized, going up to 40 BPM and winning the race. The team would not be able to push as fast and as long if they didn't trust each other. Some of the team had difficult paths in life similar to Joe.
They have been shaped into better people and given something to talk about. They needed to spend a lot of time in and out of practice to truly trust one another. All of the boys in the boat, besides the coxswain, have a matched physical potential. They all could hit a certain rowing speed, but they needed an emotional connection to be good. An example of the importance of the teams connection is in this quote, “ It isn't enough for the muscles of a crew to work in unison; their hearts and minds must also be at one” - George Yeoman Pocock 297. The whole team must be on their A-Game or else the whole boat is off. If the team started rowing off pace or in the opposite direction the boat will become unstable or even turn around. The trust component was the biggest factor to a successful crew team, allowing them to all row
together. I think The Boys in the Boat showed the importance of being able to trust others. After Joe’s parents abandoned him, the ultimate betrayal, he eventually was able to have great trust in his crew team. I can relate to the feeling of abandonment that Joe went through but at a smaller scale. I had a close friend that I trusted and connected with. After we stopped talking, I felt that I should not trust anyone, because I do not know if they will always be there for me. Like Joe, I was at first hesitant to meet other people and have complete trust in them. I came to realize that I shouldn't trust everyone I meet, but I definitely should be comfortable trusting others. The book shows that you need trust with the people you meet to develop life long friends, a happy life, and many achievements. In conclusion The Boys in the Boat by Daniel Brown, teaches a great life lesson about trust. Joe Rantz had a rough path of life living by himself, as well as pushing through intense workouts as a team, the previous quotes were good examples of how Joe channeled his energy to be a great crew teammate and was able trust others. Joe had a hard life and could have had a terrible journey, spiraling off the negative after effects. Instead he did something, and turned all of the energy into something positive. He was able to go out and win the Olympics with his team by his side. It is important to remember that you need to trust others, and this book shows how great life can be.
A prevailing theme that is present in The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown is the idea of grit. Grit is the mental toughness and firmness of mind and spirit; it is also the courage and resolve of character. The theme of grit evolves and unfolds throughout the entirety of the book. From the beginning, Joe has had to persevere through rough child hood, barely scraping by and each day strengthening himself to be more self-reliant. During school, Joe was required to change himself in order to better himself and the team. He was driven to be the best that he could; and maybe one day, he could finally fill the void left by his father. Whether it be his childhood, college, or the Berlin games, Joe had to fight through and toughen his mind
The Bragg family grew up with virtually nothing. The father left the family a number of times, offering no financial assistance and stealing whatever he could before he left. When he was there, he was usually drunk and physically abusive to the mother. He rarely went after the children, but when he did the mother was always there to offer protection. Mr. Bragg's mother's life consisted of working herself to exhaustion and using whatever money she had on the children.
The Boys in the Boat gave me a little shock. Actually, I have had a little expectation to read an English book before, so I was so excited and worried. However, the book describes very elaborately, with lots of words I haven’t seen before, what the rowers did. I realized that there were lots of words I don’t know. Moreover, it was hard to memorize the descriptive words because those are too many. Nevertheless, by reading the book again and again, it is getting better, and even it is fun now. I like the feeling that I’m learning the vocabulary every day by just reading instead of memorizing. Anyway, I have learned a lot of words from the The Boys in the Boat, and I like the story in the The boys in the Boat. One of the elements that makes me
The Boys in the Boat has a shared dream of winning gold in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, but not just the gold, it is the overall satisfaction of achieving something greater than ever imagined. Many of these boys
They were a single thing, a crew.” The boys realized they were more than just friends they were teammates. There teammate was sick and they weren’t crossing the finish line without him, so they took him along anyway. They had been working on this for three years their teammate deserved to cross the finish line. The boys learned to become a team and trust each other.
When an adult goes through a series of experiences, specifically trauma, they are forced to grow up. The story The Round House, is about Joe, a thirteen year old boy who is forced into growing up in the midst of witnessing his family fall apart from the heinous rape and near murder of his mother. Because of the attack on his mother, Joe’s life is brought into a whirlwind of new realities. The rape of his mother forced Joe into learning how to handle the situation of his mother’s attack within himself, learning how to cope with the new way of his family, and ultimately taking the life of Linden Lark. Because of the actions taken by Lark against Geraldine, Joe was pushed into to growing up too fast.
Everyone goes through challenges, but it is up to an individual to overcome and persevere through them. Daniel James Brown demonstrates his meaning of perseverance by writing The Boys in the Boat. Occurring around the Great Depression, this novel follows a group of boys from the University of Washington row team, who go through severe hardships to receive a gold medal in the 1936 Olympics. The novel focuses on the character Joe Rantz and his life journey to become a row team member. Joe Rantz, perseveres through a rollercoaster of hopeless situations, including rejection from his family, severe hunger, and the struggles from the Depression-era. The Boys in the Boat uses Joe Rantz’s young life to portray our ability to overcome obstacles and
After dinner, the two men reveled in talking about rowing for hours on end. They discussed boat design and rigging techniques, debated racing strategy, recounted past victories and defeats, and analyzed the strengths and weaknesses of other crews and coaches.”(212). These three sentences stand out for a number of reasons. The language is descriptive enough to leave the reader with a few things to think about. First, the word choice gives off a strong impression of two men who are infinitely fascinated and dedicated to rowing. It reveals the type of relationship Ulbrickson and Pocock share, a friendship that revolves around the love and passion they share for rowing and racing. On one hand, you have George Pocock who was, at the time, the greatest boat builder in the world. He has always been fond of the art of boat building since a very young age: “Most of all, it was a chance to do what Washington coaches had been doing since 1913-to learn something from Pocock, whether it was an apt quote from Shakespeare, a better way to sequence a race, or how to understand the inner workings of an oarsman’s mind” (213). This sentence was impactful because it reminds the reader about the kind of talent and role Pocock had. Pocock could effortlessly explain how each and every tool had different functions and uses when putting a shell together, recognize different types of wood
David loved his step- mother very much and was often jealous of her other commitments and lack of soul attention towards him. During his early teens, David was informed that his step- mother had been fighting breast cancer for some time. He was previously unaware, and felt betrayed by his uninforming parents. Pearl's steady decline left him devastated, and her death in 1967 found him suddenly alone with his father (Bardsley 2001). Traumatic events like David losing his mother does a great deal to an individual's development in society due to the fact that there is no longer a positive cohesive whole unit as a family. We find that many people who lack a solid family background struggle later in life. An example of this would be the two guest speakers that spoke to our criminal justice class on November 12, 2001. Both individuals had parents who were once in jail or they had a limited relationship with.
His sister and mother got taken away from them and he never once saw them again. His childhood is now just on the rim of being destroyed. He stayed really close to his father, they shared their bread, watched over each other and didn't let anyone bully them. As the days passed, the situation got worse. They were starved, physically and mentally abused.
Resilience is necessary to keep families together in tough times. Jeannette answers, ‘“No one’s neglecting us,’” when asked by the child welfare agent about her family (Walls 193). She does not tell him that they are neglecting her because she wants to keep the family together. She grows up with them and does not want to give them up even if her parents, Rex and Rose-Mary, have not provided a very stable and supportive life. After her younger sister, Maureen, leaves for California, Jeanette says, “something in all of us broke that day, and afterward, we no longer had the spirit for family gatherings” (Walls 277). They no longer feel that sense of family and togetherness that had kept them as a family; they always fought back when difficulties arose. Maureen’s
We make important choices everyday that can affect our futures. Whether it is deciding what to eat for lunch or deciding what college to go to, these decisions can affect our lives in many ways. Choice is the act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities. By making a smart choice, your health and welfare can be much better but if you make a bad choice, you future can be different than what you intended it to be. Whether it is a mild choice or a major one, choices can affect the way your life unfolds in the future. In the book, The Red Kayak by Priscilla Cummings, the main character Brady Parks is faced with a major dilemma. He has to make a decision to either turn in is friends for murder or to live
Since this bond of brotherhood is felt by all the men in the boat, but not discussed, it manifests in small ways as the men interact with each other. They are never irritated or upset with each other, no matter how tired or sore they are. Whenever one man is too tired to row, the next man takes over without complaining. When the correspondent thinks that he is the only person awake on the boat, and he sees and hears the shark in the water, the narrator says, “Nevertheless, it is true that he did not want to be alone with the thing. He wished one of his companions to awaken by chance and keep him company with it” (Crane 212).
"The Open Boat" intitles four men who have never met but become family to overcome adversity in the rough sea. The cook, oiler, correspondent, and captain all face the same problem, having to find land. As they go through several conflicts along the way, one of them begins to give up. The four men form a strong brotherhood by working together. They realize, as they paddle, that they cannot create a feud because they will never survive. None of the men are related by blood but act as so to get through the dangerous waters. "It would be difficult to describe the subtle brotherhood of the men...each man felt it warm him" (Crane, 342). The men ...
Aside of the teamwork going on is the individual effort that you yourself is contributing to the boat. As you are out on the water in the eight man boat you always need to give it your all even if it means pain. In fact, our coach just tells us to eat pain. As you are giving 100% and in pain, your brain is working 100% too. Handle height, legs down quick and hands down and away quick along with the part of feathering the blade. Those are the things you focus on during a race. Oh yeah you also have a cool little person screaming at you to pull harder. They are known as the coxswain (Cox-in). When the coach isn’t there listen to them because they are the assistant coaches. All this is the first stride you take to get that gold medal.