Personal Reflection

                After finishing the novel and all the assignments that went along with it, we had a chance to reflect on how this process has affected us.

                This process has greatly influenced the type of novels I will read from now on. Before reading my classic novel, I would just read a novel and forget about what happened a month later because the book was just not that good. The themes were relatable, but were very shallow. I felt like I had already read that same book before even though I knew I had not. 

                Once I read The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo, I discovered that what makes a novel good is it stays with you forever. From this point on I will only read novels which deeply connect to me. The point of reading is to gain knowledge in some way. By reading classic novels, you are guaranteed to learn something new each time.

                Over this process we also had to respond to our novels through the use of a blog. This blog could be seen by lots of people which caused me to feel more inclined to make sure I had no spelling mistakes and that my information was actually interesting and informative. I did not want to make my blog posts boring because I felt that that would not do justice to my novel because my novel was anything but boring.

                My understanding of literature has been altered by my reading by making me see that literature is important to human growth and development. Authors of classic novels lived a long time ago and are influenced by different events such as revolutions and wars. Classic literature shows us the value of learning from the past and not making wrong choices over and over again. Literature carries on the traces of tradition which we will never see otherwise unless we read literature.

                This process leads me to discover that as a reader, I can understand complex themes and ideas in classic literature.  My novel had many sub-plots that each had a specific role in highlighting the themes in the end. At the time I thought the sub-plots were unimportant and useless, but I learned to discover that they were crucial in discovering the themes in the novel. This process also taught me to persevere. Some parts in my novel were quite long and boring, but I knew I had to finish so I kept reading and eventually the novel picked up and was really interesting and engaging.

                Overall, I thought this project was very useful because it made us step outside our comfort zones and read a new novel. I feel that this project was good for us to do as grade eleven students because it made us more prepared for later years when taking English.