Sunday, November 8, 2015

Dear Mr. Henshaw by Beverly Cleary






Cleary, B. (1983). Dear Mr. Henshaw. NY: Morrow.


Dear Mr. Henshaw is the story of a young boy, Leigh Bots, that is communicating by post with his favorite author, Mr. Henshaw, and then later in his journal. As the boy grows, his letters get more complex. The seriousness of the issues gets heavier as he matures and begins to go through hardships.

The book Dear Mr. Henshaw is a great example of the evaluative criteria of character and style. The main character, Leigh Botts, is portrayed as a very likeable kid with problems like any other child in America. We can see that he is coming to terms with his new reality (parent divorce) as he writes letters to his favorite author and later to his diary. He is highly relatable to readers in his age group. Beverly Clearly’s style in this book is very unique. Throughout the books we can only catch glimpses of Leigh’s life as he writes to the author and as he writes in his journal. We only see the most significant things in his life that he chooses to write about making it seem as though we as the reader are not omniscient and are only allowed to see what Leigh wants us to see.

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