Speak is a 1999 novel by
Laurie Halse AndersonLaurie Halse Anderson is an American author who writes for children and young adults.-Career:...
about a girl named
Melinda SordinoMelinda Sordino is the main character and narrator of Laurie Halse Anderson's 1999 novel Speak. Her last name, Sordino, is an Italian word that can be translated as "mute" or "deaf."-Character:...
who is an
outcastOutcast may refer to:*outcast , a person with social stigma-Literature:*Guardians of Ga'Hoole Book 8: The Outcast*Outcast , a 1991 book by Iraqi-Israeli author Shimon Ballas...
as a high school
freshmanA freshman or fresher is a first-year student in secondary school, high school, or college. The term first year can also be used as a noun, to describe the students themselves A freshman (US) or fresher (UK, India) (or sometimes fish, freshie, fresher; slang plural frosh or freshmeat) is a...
. It was made into a
film of the same nameSpeak is a 2004 American independent film based on the award-winning novel of the same name by Laurie Halse Anderson. It stars a then 13-year-old Kristen Stewart as Melinda Sordino, a high school freshman who practically stops talking after being raped by a senior student. The film is told through...
in 2004. The novel was a
New York TimesThe New York Times Best Seller list is widely considered the preeminent list of best-selling books in the United States. It is published weekly in The New York Times Book Review magazine, which is published in the Sunday edition of The New York Times and as a stand-alone publication...
and
Publishers WeeklyPublishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...
bestseller.
Speak was also named a
Printz Honor bookThe Michael L. Printz Award is an annual award in the United States for a book that exemplifies literary excellence in young adult literature. It is named for a school librarian from Topeka, Kansas, who was a long-time active member of the Young Adult Library Services Association...
in 2000.
Plot summary
A few weeks before her freshman year of high school, Melinda Sordino and her friend Rachel are invited to a high school party. There, Melinda gets drunk and meets a senior, Andy Evans, who takes her to a secluded part of the woods and
rapeRape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
s her. She calls 911 and the police break up the party for underage drinking, arresting some of the kids. Numb and alone, Melinda walks miles home to an empty house. In the following weeks she tells no one what happened, and as a result, no one realizes she was raped. She becomes depressed.
All her friends and the party-goers are angry with her for getting them into trouble, and ostracize her once school starts. Desperate for friends, Melinda becomes friendly with a new girl, Heather, who clings to Melinda only to abandon her when she gets the chance to join a popular clique.
As Melinda's depression worsens, she begins to skip school, withdraws from her parents, and aspires to do nothing more than take a nap. She creates a makeshift hide-away in an abandoned janitor's closet at school, where she sleeps during the day or hides when she is feeling anxious. Her only solace is
artArt is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
class, taught by Mr. Freeman, who encourages his students to express themselves. Over time, Mr. Freeman seems to have an impact on Melinda's view of things. For most of the book, Melinda denies that she was ever raped, blaming herself for being "drunk and stupid."
When the school year is almost over, she befriends David Petrakis, her lab partner. She also begins to question her feelings about him. When her former best friend, Rachel, begins dating Andy, Melinda feels obligated to tell her about the rape. The response is intense hostility, but eventually Rachel acknowledges the truth and dumps Andy.
As the school year comes to a close, Melinda returns to her janitor's closet to gather some things she left inside it. Andy confronts her, accusing her of fabricating the assault, saying that she consented and is jealous of his relationship with Rachel. When he attempts to rape her again, she screams, breaks a mirror, and she holds a shard of glass up to his neck, saying, "I said no." Fortunately, Melinda's former friend Nicole and the
lacrosseLacrosse is a team sport of Native American origin played using a small rubber ball and a long-handled stick called a crosse or lacrosse stick, mainly played in the United States and Canada. It is a contact sport which requires padding. The head of the lacrosse stick is strung with loose mesh...
team hear her scream from the closet and come to her aid.
On the last day of school, Melinda stays late to finish her art project and finishes the course with an
A+A+ may refer to:* A+ , a blood type* A+ , the highest grade achievable in a grading system based on letters of the alphabet* A+ , a dialect of APL with aggressive extensions...
, though she is facing summer school for failing the rest of her classes. As the student body hears the story and realizes the truth about what happened at the party, Melinda goes from social pariah to something of a hero. Mr. Freeman prompts her to tell him her story, helping Melinda to finally come to terms with what happened to her and move on with her life.
Characters
- Melinda Sordino
Melinda Sordino is the main character and narrator of Laurie Halse Anderson's 1999 novel Speak. Her last name, Sordino, is an Italian word that can be translated as "mute" or "deaf."-Character:...
– The main protagonist and narrator of Speak. She is a teenager who considers herself an outcast, and is depressed and lonely. After being raped by Andy Evans at a party, she becomes secluded from her friends and for the most part ceases speaking.
- Andy Evans – The main antagonist of the book, Andy is a popular senior who attends Merryweather High School. He rapes freshman Melinda at a party. Andy is also known as "Andy Beast" and "IT" in Melinda's thoughts.
- Heather Billings – A new girl from Ohio at the beginning of the school year. She is very social and at first befriends Melinda, but later ditches her for a clique called "The Marthas".
- Ivy – Melinda's friend. They grow apart after the party, but are reunited through their art class.
- Rachel Bruin (Rachelle) – Melinda's former best friend, she attends Merryweather High School. She is popular, uptight, selfish, and a poor friend. Rachel stopped being her friend after Melinda called 9-1-1 at a party, not knowing that she had been raped. She later begins dating Andy Evans. Near the end, you could assume Melinda and her became friends again.
- David Petrakis – Melinda's highly academic lab partner. He develops feelings for Melinda, but never expresses them. He also argues his rights.
- Mr. Freeman – Melinda's overly enthusiastic art teacher. He is the only adult who understands Melinda's pain, and encourages her to express it in her art. He is very open with things and in the end of the story he helps Melinda find her way to speaking again.
Censorship
Due to its controversial subject matter,
Speak has often been challenged. In the Platinum Edition of
Speak, released 2006, Anderson spoke out against
censorshipthumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
. In material printed at the end of the novel, following an interview regarding the content of the book, Anderson wrote:
Film adaptation
The story was adapted into a
2004 filmSpeak is a 2004 American independent film based on the award-winning novel of the same name by Laurie Halse Anderson. It stars a then 13-year-old Kristen Stewart as Melinda Sordino, a high school freshman who practically stops talking after being raped by a senior student. The film is told through...
, which was directed by Jessica Sharzer and starred
Kristen StewartKristen Jaymes Stewart is an American actress. She is best known for playing Bella Swan in The Twilight Saga. She has also starred in films including Panic Room , Zathura , In the Land of Women , The Messengers , Adventureland and The Runaways .- Early life :Stewart was born and raised in Los...
as Melinda Sordino.
Translations
The book has been translated into Mandarin and is sold in
TaiwanTaiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
under the title of
I No Longer Keep Quiet (我不再沉默), and into Dutch by Hans Heesen with the name
Silent as a Grave ("Zwijg als het graf"). It was also translated into Spanish with the name
¡Habla! which could be translated as "Talk!" (referring to either a male or female) and into German with the name
Sprich! which is the command "Speak!". The book is also translated in Finnish with the name
Lukossa. The word itself is hard to translate in English, but it means quite like "Locked in" or "locked." The book was translated into Hungarian with the title
Hadd mondjam el, which means "Let Me Tell You".
Interpretation
According to Jennifer Hubert, Melinda is mute out of fear, since she calls the police about the party at the end of the summer. Her muteness also stands in for her overall difficulty communicating with her parents. In the novel, Melinda says, "My throat is always sore, my lips raw...Every time I try to talk to my parents or a teacher, I sputter or freeze.... It's like I have some kind of spastic
laryngitisLaryngitis is an inflammation of the larynx. It causes hoarse voice or the complete loss of the voice because of irritation to the vocal folds . Dysphonia is the medical term for a vocal disorder, of which laryngitis is one cause....
."