Up the Down Staircase
Page 12
The following day he appeared in class in a cap and gown–a black graduation gown and mortar-board, borrowed or rented at what trouble or expense I could only guess, and a large hammer for a gavel. He bore a look of such solemn dignity that no one dared to laugh.
He sat at my desk and said: “The court clerk is supposed to say they gotta rise.”
There was such authority in his voice that slowly, one by one, the class rose. It was a moment I don’t think I will ever forget.
The class was directed to sit down, and the wheels of justice proceeded to turn. The prosecution and the defense testified; witnesses were called, examined, cross-examined; excitement ran high. When anyone spoke out of turn, Jose would pound on the desk with his hammer: “This here court will get quiet. Call the next witness. You keep quiet, or you’ll be charged with contempt.”
He overruled every objection: “Maybe I’m stupid, but I’m the judge and you gotta listen.”
And when Harry Kagan challenged him on court procedure, he said, with quiet assurance: “I ought to know. I been.”
The court ruled for the defense.
When the bell rang, Jose slowly removed his cap and gown, folded them neatly over his notebook, and went on to his next class; but he walked as if he were still vested in judicial robes.
I don’t think he will ever be quite the same.
And that’s it; that’s why I want to teach; that’s the one and only compensation: to make a permanent difference in the life of a child.
The Willowdale offer is not so tempting, after all.
Love,
Syl
P.S. Did you know that out of the 77,000 dropouts in New York City 90% are Negroes and Puerto Ricans?
S.
MISS BARRET’S CLASSES
(USE LEFT SIDE OF BULLETIN BOARD ONLY)
___________________________________
“THOSE WHO EDUCATE CHILDREN WELL ARE MORE TO BE HONORED THAN PARENTS, FOR THESE ONLY GAVE LIFE, THOSE THE ART OF LIVING WELL.”
ARISTOTLE
___________________________________
LOST & FOUND
LOST: Green plad jacket, tore lining broke zipper. Urgent need!
Lou Martin
* * *
LOST: Make Up kit imitation red aligator.
Linda Rosen
* * *
LOST: “Hollywood Horoscope of Stars” magazine. Reward ….
Alice Blake
* * *
LOST: (Or stole! ! !) My left lense from my eyeglases between here and History.
Edward Williams, Esq.
* * *
LOST: Poster, printed with Indian Ink, saying that Government of the Students, by the Students, for the Students, shall not perish from Calvin Coolidge.
Harry A. Kagan
The Students Choice
* * *
FOUND:
* * *
BEST STUDENT SAMPLES:
“The Theater of the Absurd and All the Angry Young Men”
A Comparative Study
by Elizabeth Ellis
If there is a connection between absurdity and despair, and I believe there is, then Edward Albee, John Osborne, Harold Pinter and Arthur Kopit are all brothers trapped under the same skin. In examining both the symptoms and the more obvious manifesta—
(cont. on next page)
SPELING QUIZ – 100%
Vivian Paine
1. accept
2. acquainted
3. advice
4. artichoke
5. ascend
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“READING MAKETH A FULL MAN, CONFERENCE A READY MAN, AND WRITING AN EXACT MAN.”
SIR FRANCIS BACON
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HUMOR
St. Peter: “Who is knocking at my gate?”
Voice:“It is I.”
St. Peter:“Go away, we don’t need any more school teachers here!”
Teacher: “There are two words in the English language you must never use. One of them is swell and the other is lousy.”
Pupil: “What are they?”
___________________________________
JOB OPPORTUNITIES
Experienced Baby Sitter. Apply Office 211.
* * *
MISS LEWIS’ CLASS:
(USE RIGHT SIDE OF BULLETIN BOARD ONLY)
___________________________________
THE 3 C’s: CHARACTER + CONFLICT = CLIMAX
THE 5 E’s: EXAMINE, EVALUATE, EXPRESS, ELUCIDATE, END
“CUE” = COHERENCE, UNITY, EMPHASIS
BEST STUDENT SAMPLES:
TRUE OR FALSE TEST – 100%
Kurt Werner
1. T
2. F
3. F
4. T
5. T
6. F
7. T
8. F
9. F
10.T
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COMMITTEE CHAIRMEN:
Paper Distribution Committee–Luis Ramos
Blackboard Committee–Judy Thornwald
Sanitary Committee–Sybelle Klopotkin
Room Traffic Committee–Wong Gee
___________________________________
CLASS ACHIEVEMENT GRAPH:
INTRASCHOOL COMMUNICATION
FROM: 304
TO: 508
Dear Bea–
Thank you for letting me observe your Senior Honors and Creative Writing classes; it was worth giving up my unassigned and lunch periods to see! How wonderful to hear a discussion of Hamlet’s relationship to Ophelia on such an adult level! Their insights, their involvement, their comments on their outside reading were a revelation to me. And your Creative Writing class made me aware of how much is going on inside them; how serious and yet how touchingly young they are. I wanted to hug each and every one of them. And you.
I realize these are specially selected groups, the cream off the top, but at least I know that this kind of student exists, and this kind of teaching is possible.
Can we meet for a few minutes? I’m bursting to talk to you about it!
(You promised to let me see the paragraphs they were writing in class.)
Enviously,
Syl
INTRASCHOOL COMMUNICATION
FROM: 508
TO: 304
Dear Syl,
Never mind the cream; it will always rise to the top. It’s the skim milk that needs good teachers.
Enclosed are a few of their papers; I haven’t corrected them yet.
Sorry can’t meet you now: Am with child.
Bea
* * *
MRS. SCHACHTER’S CREATIVE WRITING CLASS ASSIGNMENT:
Write one paragraph, asking a probing question on any topic you wish. Give it a suitable title.
Remember what you’ve learned about the use of imagery in conveying emotion.
THE WORLD’S INDIFFERENCE
Stink and stench assailled his nostrils as he reeled drunkenly into the room. The whisky lay heavy in his gut. His belly rumbled. “I think I’ll puke”, he thought. But by then they had him. Handcuffs, the works. “Why?” he shouted from his very gut. “Why me?” But the world kept rolling along.
SPRING REMEMBERED
I remember Spring. The lilacs and the stars. The rose and the dew. You and the night. I remember. I remember holding hands beneath the moon which was suspended like a silver locket upon a chain of stars from the neckline of a cloud. I remember the leaves whispering like lacy gossips in the trees. I remember the lake lapping. I remember how sharp like a thorn was love. Why do I not remember your Name?
IMAGES
Look, the cat! The cat is on the mat. I can spell cat. But what is cat? That is the question! The cat is a fog or smudgey smoke from a cigarette or a purry furry ball or a tiger ready to spring at you. You never know.
LIFE, BE NOT PROUD
> Life, be not proud, thou hast made many mistakes tho thou hadst had a chance to be beautiful, yet thou hadst fouled it up. Why is there sufering and troubles galore? Why is there man’s inhumanity to man? Why is there prejudice between all the races? Why is there jails and hoor houses and lynches and unemployment? Why is there death? Life, be not proud!
SNOW
The snow lies on mountain and dale like a naked woman exposing its glistering white body voluptously and proud of her nakedness under the warm sun. Soon the warm sun will melt it. What then?
THE SUBWAY
The subway is a monster giant snake that crawls inside the Bowels of the Earth, emerging to vomit forth its food at the different stations. It then swallows another belly full of us to crawl into the Bowels where darkness dwells. Who knows when it will re-emerge again?
WHY DO I LOVE?
Brown throated is my love and potent are his groins and laughing are his long lashed eyes. The songs he sings are many. His lips, insistent with passion’s flame, are smooth upon my young mouth. Although my love doth walk with feet of clay upon my heart, I do not care: I love. Why do I love? I know not. I only know I love.
LIFE REFLECTED IN THE TELEVISION EYE
I see the television eye. It does not see me albeit I scream jump laugh weep rant rage stick out my tongue at it. Within the television eye, among the shadows and the horizontal streaks the little people live and love and eat and die interupted by commercials. While I, yes I, posess the power to turn them off whenever I feel like it. Just so to God are we as they, for Lo! He can stop our mouths while in the middle of a sentence and snap our hearts in twain. His Eye sees us albeit we do not see Him. What is God?–God is the Universal Antenna.
THE FUTURE?
The question I ask can never be answered while in the proccess of being asked. For I inquire about the Future. And only the Future can tell about itself. Is it there for us? We’re a fast breed because we don’t know if there is time ahead or total anihilation of Man. I sometimes wonder, what will become of me and my forthcoming children?
ACENTUATE THE POSITIVE
Who?
What?
When?
Where?
Why?
How?
O foolish ? mark, it doesn’t matter. What matters is the ! To ? is to be told how bad you are and various problems better not to know. So only live with !
TO WHAT SHALL I COMPARE THEE TO?
You are to me a Sunday morning smelling of frying bacon and promises of more. You are to me a racing car at 95 miles per hr. that no one else has. You are to me a lazy curtesan in her feminine bed room with ostrich feathers fanning her brow. You are to me a fresh meadowland. You are to me the sounds of the City that spell a band of gypsies with tamburines and hunking cars and tooting trucks’ symphony or the hot beat of Rock n Roll that jerks a thousand feet. You are to me the end of the line. But what am I to you?
INTEGRATION
They speak of Integration. It’s a word. What does it mean: a bus? a cop? a school? a headline? a tomstone? a neighbor’s fight? a parent’s yells? a speech? a boycot? a politician? It’s all the same to me for words are only words. Yet deep and dark, deeper than any well and darker than any skin something lies and slumbers. Unburry it and hearken what it says. A simple truth: My brother.
UNTITLED
To be
Or not to be–
By this
I mean:
To be myself?
(Who am I though?)
Or else to be
What my parents
(Alas, poor Yorik, I knew them well!)
Would like me to be
Because
Of their own regrets
Or
What the World expects?
(The choice is tough)
The rest is silence ….
THE OLD MAN
The old man just stood there. Just stood. There. Where I was. A reproach? To my youth, perhaps. To my good health. His chest was sunk. His hands shook with palsy. Finished. Through. Finis. His sands of time had run. But mine had just begun. Someday I too. Not now. Not yet. Why, then, do I feel so guilty?
THE MURDERER
I saw him scuttling like a crook, making his fearful way, stelthy among the dirty dishes crustied with grease in the sink, bearing a morsle of food to his secret sons behind the drain board. How fearful were his eyes. Shall I kill him?
(Mrs. Schachter–Is it clear I am talking about a cockaroach?)
MONTHLY REPORT ON PHYSICAL CONDITION OF ROOM
ROOM: 304
TEACHER: S. BARRETT OCT. 13
Door off hinge
Sliding wardrobe panel doesn’t close; blackboard on it can’t be used.
Book closet, back of room, broken; shelf splintered.
Window in back, right, broken.
Teacher’s desk missing two drawers.
Radiator keeps clanging.
(Same conditions prevail as in last month’s report, with addition of radiator. Hole in window getting bigger, though. Wind and rain blowing in. Also, glass crunching underfoot.
S. Barrett
* * *
Dear Miss Barrett,
You have neglected to send in attendance sheet for today.
Sadie Finch
Chief Clerk
* * *
Dear Miss Finch,
The reason is that Linda Rosen chose to wear a pink sweater and fuchsia stretch pants to school this morning. She was seen by Mr. McHabe, who invited her to cool her heels in the office. She was also seen by the boys in my homeroom, who migrated en masse to her vicinity. Since we had no quorum, I couldn’t take attendance. I will do so this afternoon–unless they have followed her like lemmings into the sea and are all drowned.
S. Barrett
* * *
FROM: JAMES J. MCHABE, ADM. ASST.
TO: MISS S. BARRETT
Dear Miss Barrett,
All out of board erasers. All out of red pencils. Requisition for window-poles has been sent to the Board last spring–we must be patient.
There has been an epidemic of chalk-stealing. Please keep chalk under lock except when in use.
Can you use some posters? Still have left-over yellow on green TRUTH IS BEAUTY, also some black on white LEARNING=EARNING.
JJ MCH
(A frivolous attitude and levity of tone towards attendance taking are unsuitable to the high seriousness of our profession.)
JJ MCH
* * *
INTRASCHOOL COMMUNICATION
FROM: 304
TO: 508
Dear Bea–
Fired by my visit to your classes, I asked Dr. Bester if I might observe other English teachers, to learn more about techniques. Stony silence. I guess no one else is willing to be seen. (I was particularly eager to discover how Henrietta teaches Punctuation Traffic. I understand she uses a system of signals such as Stop, Go, Curves Ahead ….)
Had another run-in with J.J. McH., in connection with my levity. But I’ve got to hold on to my sense of humor–which is really a sense of proportion.
“You and Mrs. Schachter are the only teachers with humors in the entire school,” a student said to me. “You see the funny sides, which makes it easier.”
It makes it much easier. How can I take seriously such mimeographed absurdities as “Lateness due to absence,” “High under-achiever,” and “Polio Consent slips”?
Syl
* * *
INTRASCHOOL COMMUNICATION
FROM: 508
TO: 304
Dear Syl,
I’ll match yours any day with: “Please disregard the following.”
Bea
* * *
FROM: JAMES J. MCHABE, ADM. ASST.
TO: ALL TEACHERS
YOUR WHOLE-HEARTED COOPERATION IS ESSENTIAL IN DISCOURAGING ILLEGITIMATE LATENESSES, SINCE THEY TAKE AWAY TIME FROM VALUABLE SCHOOL TIME. PENALTIES FOR INFRACTIONS MUST
BE FOLLOWED THROUGH.
JJ McH
* * *
Admit to class: 9:30 A.M.
Lateness unexcused. Claims got lost in transit.
JJ MCH
* * *
CIRCULAR # 59
PLEASE KEEP ALL CIRCULARS ON FILE, IN THEIR ORDER