Free Essay

Gryphon

In:

Submitted By znuttz20
Words 1215
Pages 5
The “Gryphon” Experience Gryphon presents a fourth-grade boy, Tommy, and his class’s experience with a peculiar substitute teacher, Miss Ferenczi. Tommy narrates the story as a mature, experienced adult from afar. The students are confronted with more than just a substitute teacher. They are presented with an unaccustomed view of the world and are challenged to open their minds and think for themselves. Do not believe everything you hear and do not be afraid to go against the grain of humdrum normalcy, are central to “Gryphon”, whose key symbol (Miss Ferenczi) support its central theme: life is dreary and uninspiring without a sense of imagination and wonder. Tommy’s classroom is the typical fourth grade setting with arithmetic, spelling, and history lessons. The classroom itself doesn’t change throughout the story, but everything new to Tommy and his classmates is introduced in the classroom by Miss Ferenczi, whose thought provoking instruction techniques set “Gryphon” into action. Liken to a container, the classroom is filled with information, of which, the children pick and choose to take their “knowledge”. Before the substitute, the children’s teacher forced knowledge upon the students through memorization. Mr. Hibner’s teaching methods, selection of material, or mandated school lessons have exiled Tommy and his classmates into a conventional educational system that produces run of the mill people through mind-numbing fact recitals dubbed “knowledge”.

For Tommy, the classroom is his world and he attempts to make the most of it, prompted by the unorthodox Miss Ferenzci. Miss Ferenczi challenges her students to take her information for what it’s worth. Whether to agree or disagree with the literal meaning is of secondary value, but most importantly, actively engaging in the imagination marauding necessary to invoke self-actualization and decide for themselves what inspires them. Tommy’s fourth-grade classroom represents an idyllic setting for intense imagination of far off worlds and self exploration (with Miss Ferenzci substituting) where the students are finding their own truth, as opposed to Mr. Hibner’s mundane lesson plan of arithmetic and “the modes of Egyptian irrigation” (K&M 243). Miss Ferenczi’s tutelage represents a breath of fresh air and a new experience for her students. Everything about her is foreign to the students yet not inaccessible. Hope and truth are connected within Miss Ferenzci; her style of dress, lunch choices, and forthright speech are prime examples. Miss Ferenczi has found her own truth, herself, as evidenced by her nonconformist attitude, elaborate dress, delightful stories, and a touch of humility. She exemplifies that all adults are not like those the children are accustomed in their community. Miss Ferenczi’s symbolism of truth is foreshadowed by Tommy when he notices his substitute’s peculiar marionette lines reminding him of Pinocchio. Pinocchio is a wooden boy who wants to be real and is a liar. Miss Ferenczi may be a real, in the flesh, person, but she is very surreal to Tommy and his classmates; they’ve never seen anything like her. Also, Miss Ferenczi bends the truth and tells stories of myths in order to provoke the students’ sense of thought, imagination, and wonder. The truths the children seek are far beyond spelling and arithmetic, but constitute the character the students will eventually mesh with and emit.

Tommy and his mates are in a critical part of their lives. They are growing up and if they can’t find imagination now, they’ve likely lost it forever. Miss Ferenczi is the vessel for the children’s newfound knowledge of truths and not so truths, but she leaves the children to have their own experience with this newfound information, rather than teach her students what to think based on her largely personal, somewhat professional opinion. Miss Ferenczi is like a gryphon to her students. She is strange and exotic in her dress, food choices, and thoughts. The children cannot take their eyes off her when first introduced and quickly begin to question her mathematical knowledge. Miss Ferenczi states, “In higher mathematics, which you children do not yet understand, six times eleven can be considered to be sixty-eight” (K&M 241). The students feel uncomfortable with Miss F.’s arithmetic analysis because it questions what they already know to be true. They can either go along with Miss F. and imagine the possibility of her thoughts while exercising their own insight and imagination and be no worse (hopefully better) off than they already were, or disregard Miss F.’s thoughts as phony. The latter will not produce genuine thoughts of the students’ own and threaten to hinder their sense of wonder, leaving an uninspired, ordinary individual. Miss Ferenczi draws a tree on the chalkboard that is “…outsized, disproportionate” (K&M 239). The tree represents knowledge and wisdom in many a society’s educational system and does so here as well. Miss F.’s unbalanced tree signifies the imagination factor that is equally, if not more so, essential to learning and wisdom. Miss Ferenczi does a tarot card reading for her students, showing she is in tune with myths and folklore. She begins by saying, “…I shall tell your fortunes, as I have been taught to do” (K&M 247). Miss F. shows her students that even something as mythical and fabricated as a fortune can be taught, and thus be considered knowledge.
“When Miss Ferenczi, using Tarot cards, tells a boy named Wayne he will soon die, the story delivers a moment of shocking cruelty” (Winans 2). Molly Winans alludes to the mystery of the tarot reading as heartless at times. People usually don’t like change and the inevitable unexpected, because it can make people feel awkward and stressed. Wayne, very ill at ease with the prospect of death arriving, told on Miss F. to the principal which resulted in her being fired. Change, which is what the death card really meant for Wayne, is sometimes hostile and can be hard to come to terms with, but is an opportunity for growth of the imagination. She confronts her students with this to help them decipher their own truths from the information they’re confronted with and build their very own knowledge. Destiny mingles with the truths the children seek, whether they know it or not. A sick Mr. Hibner needed Miss Ferenczi to substitute for a few days, which changed Tommy’s outlook on life after finding truth through imagination. The universe has unfolded to show Tommy and his class different approaches they can take to their own life, shown through Miss Ferenczi. “Gryphon” also shows that destiny is always in motion. If the children accept where they are and who they are on the basis of who their parents are and what they do, or because of the typical people who surround them in their comfortable community, they are fighting against the supreme order and variable intricacies of the universe. To this end, self-actualization will never be found, leading to an unhappy life. Possibility is the spark of everything that exists. Miss Ferenczi, in Charles Baxter’s “Gryphon”, introduced wonder and possibility for Tommy and his classmates to experience, and apply to their own lives.

Works Cited
Kirszner, Laurie, and Stephen Mandell. Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing. 6th ed. Boston: Thomson Wadsworth, 2007.
Winans, Molly. “Bigger Than We Think: The World Revealed in Charles Baxter’s Fiction.” Commonweal 7 November 1997: 1-6.

Similar Documents

Premium Essay

Gryphon Research Paper

...The Fortune Telling Truth of Gryphon The history of fortune telling dates back to the early fourteenth century. Tarot cards were commonly used in the practice of fortune telling during these times. This practice of fortune telling through the use of tarot cards is the main topic in story Gryphon. Although the practice of fortune telling with use of tarot cards is not widely used or believed in today, the story Gryphon by Charles Baxter tell a story of a substitute teacher named Ms. Ferenczi and her fortune telling practices. One of the most interesting and controversial topics in this story is the use of her tarot cards to tell the future. Tarot cards have been used for centuries, but no one has ever given proof of if they really work or not. Although Ms. Ferenczi is a very special woman, no person can predict what the future holds for other people is an accurate manner. Tarot cards first entered Europe in the late fourteenth century. At this time, tarot cards were only used for playing...

Words: 840 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Charles Baxter Gryphon

...The story “Gryphon” written by Charles Baxter is about a boy named Tommy who attends Five Oaks Elementary School in Five Oaks; a small town in Michigan. He has a teacher named Mr. Hibler. He started to get sick during their lesson, so the next day, they had a substitute named Mrs. Ferenczi. She wasn’t from Five Oaks. Nobody in the class has ever seen her before. She wasn’t like any other substitute teacher. She was strange according to Tommy and the rest of his class. The main characters of the story is, Mrs. Ferenczi, Tommy, and Wayne. Mrs. Ferenczi is the substitute teacher that is not normal. Tommy describes her as a strange looking woman with lines on the side of her mouth that make her look like a marionette. (P. 44 L. 85) She is not from Five Oaks so nobody has ever seen her in that town before. She tells interesting stories that seem like a fairytale, but sometimes some of the stories sound some what true. She sometimes goes off topic when she is teaching, but still is a good teacher and does what she needs to do....

Words: 522 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Posed Ideas In Charles Baxter's Gryphon

...and the body of a lion. This animal is the title to Charles Baxter's short story, Gryphon. The mythical creature is an illustration of the boundless nature of the ideas introduced to the main character, who is a boy in the fourth grade. Being so young, the ideas fascinate the boy in a manner to which he believes them to be true. Posed ideas fascinate the reader as well, and yet they are not fully explored throughout the entire story. The ideas in question are contradictory to generally accepted laws on Earth, like 6 multiplied by 11 being 66. The boy is told that it can be 68 sometimes. Who tells a kid such a thing? Miss Ferenczi, the substitute teacher. Wouldn't it be nice if that were true? If numbers and words could be 'right'' in any form? Throughout the storytelling, Baxter makes Miss Ferenczi’s claims increasingly enticing. Despite a lack of conflict, an explanation for the substitute’s presence is what keeps the tale going. From the moment Miss Ferenczi enters the room, it is like the students have been transported to another world. As a character, she is strange because she is different from anything the students have encountered. Unrestricted by lesson plans, she tells them facts, legends, and weaves them together all of the while, speaking of encounters with angels and sightings of gryphons in Egypt....

Words: 414 - Pages: 2

Free Essay

My Favorite Place

...ALICE'S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND By Lewis Carroll This book, Alice in Wonderland, is a Mid-Frequency Reader and has been adapted to suit readers with a vocabulary of 4,000 words. It is about 27,500 words in length. It is available in three versions of different difficulty. This version is adapted from the Project Gutenberg E-text prepared by the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/). In this book, the adaptation involved replacing over 152 word families. There are 82 different word families at the 5th 1000 level and 62 words beyond that, totalling a target vocabulary of 144 words. It was adapted by Sonia Millett. This famous children’s story written in 1865 is an early example of the fantasy or nonsense genre. The story plays with time, imagery, logic and language and for this reason remains popular with adult readers as well as children. You will meet many species of talking animals as well as characters from the pack of cards. You will encounter unusual interesting usages of language such as 'curiouser' and 'uglification'. CHAPTER I. Down the Rabbit-Hole Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had looked into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, 'and what is the use of a book,' thought Alice 'without pictures or conversation?' So she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her...

Words: 27511 - Pages: 111

Free Essay

A&P Contrast

...“A&P” and “Gryphon” have two very unique story plots yet they seem to resemble one interesting characteristic that develops throughout the story leading to an interesting turn of events. The stories are both told in first person narrative and have a sort of interesting rebellious appeal to them. It begins with the contrast between the stories plot development but leads to a troublesome “fork in the road” type scenario that puts an interesting twist onto the conclusion of the story. Some may see rebelliousness as acting against the norm but “John Updike” the author of A&P tells a tale of how two different sets of people both defy society and begin paving a way of change into the new generation. “Gryphon’s” story set is told from how a change in the way we think may leave us changing the way we live our lives. The stories may seem to have different alternatives overall but the way they are portrayed by the authors have a similar comparative aspect that can be looked at from both angles regardless of the storyline. When someone seems destined to choose a different path in life often times people may see this person as an outcast or indifferent to some. In A&P Sammy seems to not to be fulfilled with the way he spends his dull uneventful youth life ultimately leading to the defiance and betrayed to his boss over a deemed inappropriate act. “"Is it done?" he asks, the responsible married man finding his voice. I forgot to say he thinks he's going to be manager some sunny...

Words: 799 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Reaction Paper

...comes across a little house and shrinks herself down enough to get inside. This is where she encounters a Duchess and the Cook battling fiercely. Alice next meets the Cheshire cat that helps her find her way through the woods, but warns her that everyone she meets will be mad. Alice enters the March Hare’s house where she is treated to a Mad Tea Party. Alice leaves the tea party and finds a tree with a door in it. This is where she started her adventure and goes through another door where she ends up in the garden of the Queen of Hearts. The Queen invites Alice to play croquet, which is a very hard game in Wonderland, as the balls and mallets are live animals. Alice soon encounters more strange creatures such as the Gryphon and the Mock Turtle. The Gryphon then drags Alice to see the trail of the Knave of Hearts. The Knave of Hearts has been accused of stealing the...

Words: 847 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Toby Turner Research Paper

...officer.[8] Interviewed about the video by MTV, Turner explained that, after watching the clip, "as soon as [he] heard [Andrew] yelling, [he] knew it would fit in a hip-hop song", and that he "wanted to give [Andrew] the profits" from sales of related merchandise.[8] The "Tobuscus" channel has since continued to focus on comedic skits and animated sketches. Turner's "Literal Trailers" series is one of his most popular, earning him mainstream recognition from CBS News, who described his rendition of the Dead Island trailer as "amazing" and "hilarious",[9] and Wired, who praised the Iron Man 3 video.[10] Having begun his video-making career in Niceville, Turner moved to Los Angeles, California in 2008, where he currently resides with his dog Gryphon.[11] In April 2009 he began using his "TobyTurner" channel for daily unedited vlogs dubbed "lazy vlogs", and for each vlog gave away a free "Tobuscus"-branded t-shirt to a lucky viewer.[2] Later in July 2010 Toby registered his fourth (third in use) YouTube channel under the name "TobyGames",[3] designating it for a new series of comedic Let's Play videos. The channel has featured playthrough videos of numerous games since its inception, including the long-running Minecraft and Happy Wheels series. As a running theme, Toby has used the phrase "Toby sucks at *video game title*" when naming his videos to concur with the opinion that he often has a lack of skill when playing.[12] As of August 26, 2015, the Tobuscus channel has over 6.3 million...

Words: 370 - Pages: 2

Premium Essay

The Outgoing Substitute

...The Outgoing Substitute Going through school, students were always excited to see a substitute teacher enter into their classroom because it meant for an easy day. The students in Charles Baxter’s “Gryphon” probably did feel the same way when Miss Ferenczi, their substitute teacher, would walk into the classroom. Miss Ferenczi is no ordinary substitute teacher because she had the students draw their own conclusions but in an unusual way. She taught the students in a way that made them use their imagination and question what she was teaching them. Miss Ferenczi was a younger woman with a joyful personality that had a mission to open the minds of the students who attended Five Oaks Elementary and create an experience that they would not usually receive with any other normal substitute teacher. The students at Five Oaks Elementary were aware and ready to do the same day to day routine, when it came to their school work. They knew what to expect each day when they entered into the classroom, until Miss Ferenczi came along. Miss Ferenczi made quite the first impression to the students with her purple purse and her checkerboard lunchbox. There was something different about her and the students could tell as soon as she walked in the door. She walks to the blackboard, picking up pieces of white and green chalk, and draws a large tree and states how the classroom needed a tree. It grabs the students’ attention and has them wondering who this substitute is. Miss Ferenczi then goes...

Words: 741 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Jvjkhvgmnvnvnm

...Writing Prompt 2 I am a 10th grader currently attending Rocky Mount High School. Though I been here for only two years its almost like I’ve been here for an eternity. Over the past year at this school, I have been introduced to a lot of things. Some things I was use to feeling, and then there were other things that I was oblivious to. Coming from a small middle school I wasn’t use to a lot of stuff dealing with school. Yes we had our few extra curriculums, sports, and daily drama but other than that there wasn’t much to school. It was all about making good grades and having some friends. Before I came to this particular school I had heard a lot about it. In 2012, after a decade the school finally got rebuilt. Excitingly, it came out to be a success. It was a big beautiful school with great exterior and interior. The thing about the remodel of the school that attracted a lot of people to it is that the school had invested a lot in to the extra curricular activities. The school has two gyms, a tennis court, football and track field, baseball field, theatre arts room, and etc. Everybody and their parents wanted their child to go to the new school. Luckily, the school was in my district for me to attend. Even though the school was being moved in to a new area with a more modern facility the school’s old reputation wasn’t forgotten that easily. From what I heard I expected a lot. Surprisingly, the bad out weighing the good. I expected there to be a lot of altercations amongst the...

Words: 1015 - Pages: 5

Premium Essay

Autonomic Computing

...Autonomic Computing: An Overview Manish Parashar1 and Salim Hariri2 The Applied Software Systems Laboratory, Rutgers University, Piscataway NJ, USA 2 High Performance Distributed Computing Laboratory, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA parashar@caip.rutgers.edu, hariri@ece.arizona.edu 1 Abstract. The increasing scale complexity, heterogeneity and dynamism of networks, systems and applications have made our computational and information infrastructure brittle, unmanageable and insecure. This has necessitated the investigation of an alternate paradigm for system and application design, which is based on strategies used by biological systems to deal with similar challenges – a vision that has been referred to as autonomic computing. The overarching goal of autonomic computing is to realize computer and software systems and applications that can manage themselves in accordance with high-level guidance from humans. Meeting the grand challenges of autonomic computing requires scientific and technological advances in a wide variety of fields, as well as new software and system architectures that support the effective integration of the constituent technologies. This paper presents an introduction to autonomic computing, its challenges, and opportunities. 1 Introduction Advances in networking and computing technology and software tools have resulted in an explosive growth in networked applications and information services that cover all aspects of our life. These sophisticated...

Words: 5552 - Pages: 23

Premium Essay

Identity In Alice's Meeting With The Caterpillar

...However, when it comes to an individual identity, as shown in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, this concept from philosophy doesn’t always work. While Alice does portray some attributes of a serpent, she isn’t one. Alice’s psychological identity becomes contested when the Cheshire Cat compares her to the other beings in Wonderland. The Cheshire Cat, through a similar logic as the pigeon, defines himself and Alice as mad by stating that all who are in Wonderland are mad (Carroll 65). This again shows using words to define an identity is not accurate, despite the seemingly sound logic behind the definitions. A majority of Alice’s interactions with Wonderland’s inhabitants confuse her with completely different meanings. The Mock Turtle and the Gryphon call their teacher “Tortoise,” despite him being a turtle. The Mock Turtle clarifies, “we called him Tortoise because he taught us (Carroll 93)!” Words not only have literal definitions but personal connotations as well. A connotation is a meaning behind a word that comes from culture or emotions. When the Mock Turtle identifies his teacher as Tortoise; the literal definition isn’t accurate, but the connotation alters the meaning. When the Queen of Hearts invites Alice to a game of croquet, she is shocked by the difference in the game; the mallets and balls were live animals, the arches were made of the living playing cards. Croquet based on Alice’s definition is completely different then the Wonderland connotation. When the use of connotation...

Words: 1194 - Pages: 5

Free Essay

Child Care

...Opening a Quality Child Care Center A resource guide for starting a business and planning a child care center. Table of Contents: Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 First Steps: Assessment, Market Analysis, Business Plan and Child Care Licensing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Finding Your Facility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Design Considerations and Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Program Administration and Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . 17 Appendix A: Timeline for Start-up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Appendix B: Agencies and On-line Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Appendix C: Resources for Developing Polices/Procedures . . . . . 22 Appendix D: Classroom Equipment and Materials List . . . . . . . . 23 Appendix E: Care About Childcare Criteria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Appendix F: Structural Rules from Licensing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27 Appendix G: Accreditation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Appendix H: Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 State of Utah, Department of Workforce Services, Office of Child Care © 2012 Opening a Quality Child Care Center Introduction THE BUSINESS OF CHILD CARE Welcome to the world and work of child care! The purpose of this manual is to provide a prospective child care center...

Words: 14149 - Pages: 57

Premium Essay

Secular Organization and Sacred Places Paper

...Secular Organizations and Sacred Places Paper Team C Tammy Gillespie, Mary Gurganus, Nicole Plescher, Charles Zack, Joseph Cruz HUM 105 University of Phoenix April 11, 2011 Introduction Sacred places are critical elements in the mythic traditions that Team C has been studying and the stories surrounding the world’s myths are important as well. The stories surrounding the sacred places are important as the mythic breaks into today’s present high technological world, with the boundary crossings from the past to the present world today. The stories can come from a sacred sight, a secular organization, or some site with supernatural revelation that can link the past to the present with the myths (stories) told about an ancient people, or an ancient civilization through the myths. Stories about sacred places allow today’s humanity to see past versus present, realistic versus mythological, or spiritual versus materialistic (University of Phoenix, 2011). Team C ran across an article that showed a new sacred site in today’s world that will seem ancient to the future generations, but not for today’s generation...

Words: 1896 - Pages: 8

Free Essay

Financial Risk Analysis

...Company First Last 1  Solution,  LLC 2  Dog  RC 440  Mission  Support  Group 440th  Mission  Support  Group 82nd  Airborne A-­‐Safe A-­‐Safe A1  CONSULTING  GROUP,  INC. A1  CONSULTING  GROUP,  INC. A1  Supply  Company A1  supply  company A1  supply  company AAFMAA  Wealth  Management  &  Trust AAFMAA  Wealth  Management  &  Trust ABB Academy  Securities Academy  Securities Academy  Securities Adaptiv Adaptiv Adaptive  Therapies Adayana  Government  Group ADS  Inc ADS  Inc Advaero  Technologies Advanced  Electronic  Services,  Inc Advanced  Electronic  Services,  Inc Advanced  Technology,  Inc. Advantage  International  Registrar,  Inc. Advantage  International  Registrar,  Inc. afpe All  in  One  Drug  Testing  Services ALL  STATE  SUPPLY  CO.,  INC. ALL  STATE  SUPPLY  CO.,  INC. Almavision ALOTECH,  INC. American  Product  Distributors,  Inc. American  Source,  Inc. AMERICAN  SYSTEMS American  Systems American  Systems Amidon,  Inc. Amidon,  Inc. Amidon,  Inc. Amidon,  Inc. Anderson  Engineering  &  Associates,  P.A. Anderson  Engineering  &  Associates,  P.A. Angler  Environmental Anistar  Technologies Anistar  Technologies Apple  Rock ARC ...

Words: 6665 - Pages: 27

Free Essay

Personality Instrument

...Running Head: PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENT 1 Personality Assessment Instrument Tabatha Johnson Measurement and Statistics/525 February 18, 2013 Dr. Christie Seiler, Psy.D. PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENT 2 Abstract It has been proven that the Stanford Binet test has helped diagnosed developmental disabilities and is very useful in clinical and neurological assessment on identifying intellectually deficient children. This paper will describe the characteristics, uses, and purposes of identifying intellectually deficient children. Analyzing the personality relationships of Cognitive Thinking with intellectually deficient children. Summarizing and differentiate diagnostically the targeted population of the intellectually deficient children. Identifying the psychometric properties of the Stanford Binet test for the particular population of the intellectually deficient children. Finally concluding with two review literatures, The Family Education Rights & Privacy Act and APA guidelines for development, administration and scoring and interpretation of tests for ethical consideration associated with the Stanford-Binet testing. PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENT 3 Stanford-Binet Personality Assessment Test The Stanford-Binet Personality Assessment Test was developed in France to initiate the modern field in intelligence testing. This test was revised in the United...

Words: 1796 - Pages: 8