Ethan Persaud - Childhood Reading, The Crossover

As a kid, my mom always wanted me to read more, and the series that got me into that was The Crossover by Kwame Alexander. Reflecting on this reading now, it is interesting to me how it connects back to this course through its capture of transformation and identity. This book and Josh’s journey is not just about basketball, but navigating family, relationships, and personal maturity. This connects back to our discussions on universal human experiences and the stages of life. Everyone experiences growth through different phases of their life, and The Cross captures this beautifully. From Josh bantering with his brother constantly, engaging in deep conversations with his dad, and going through the high school experience, these are all universal human things that we experience throughout our lives. The structure of the novel also reflects many mythic elements. Josh begins in a familiar world, faces conflict and emotional trails, and ultimately comes to a deeper understanding of himself. This is another reading that connects back to the idea of the hero’s journey and the idea of biotransformative experiences. The events that occur throughout the reading fundamentally change the trajectory of his life, similar to how the choices we make in our high school experiences change the trajectory of our lives. A prime example of something like this is the decision of where we decide to go to college. This is a huge decision that is something universal for every person at Christopher Newport that has life changing ramifications if we don’t pick a college that suits our lifestyle. Some people succeed with this, and others struggle and make a choice that isn’t the best for them. Another unique aspect to this novel is the inclusion of sports. Sports often create these similar transformative moments. Challenges, losses, and responsibilities force growth that extends far beyond the game itself. For sports players, these are all universal experiences that are part of the stages of life. Overall, this book proved interesting to analyze from the lens of things that we learned in this class.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Kip Redick Example of a blog post 1

  I just had a few thoughts on what "wilderness of the soul" meant. In class we discussed that it meant uncharted territory within yourself and I thought of Freud's Iceberg analogy where most of the hidden unconscious is the part of the iceberg that remains underwater. There had always been a debate between psychology and religion in regards to what exactly a soul is. Some would say that the soul is the consciousness of the human brain, while others argue it is something spiritual linking us to God. But in response to the wilderness aspect, I do wonder how much of ourselves do we not actually know? I have always thought of myself as someone who knows exactly who I am, but since this class discussion I'm not so sure. Don't get me wrong- I am not upset about this, but I am certainly more curious. It's almost exciting to think about what else I could learn about myself, but also slightly nerve-wracking. What if I learn something new that I don't ...
Read more

Kip Redick Introduction

 Welcome to the Heroes and Mystics blog for 2026. Make sure to start the blog with your name and the subject of the entry (Just as I have done with this post). . Blog entries will be considered informal writing assignments and as such will be graded more in relation to content than style. Blog entries will contain questions and answers to questions, as well as reflections that relate to daily classroom discussions, completion of exercises, and reading assignments. Any questions the student has while reading or completing assignments should be written in their blog. Reflections may relate to connections the student makes between discussions in this class and those in other classes, between arguments raised in the readings in this class and those raised in other classes or from informal conversations. Students are encouraged to apply the ideas learned in this class to activities that take place outside of the class. These applications make great reflections. The studen...
Read more

Kip Redick Example of a blog post 2

  Page 4 Michael Taussig would suggest Juan's understanding of the meaning of a place emerges out of the process of an imitation of all the “differences” that we discern there. We mimic (in language and action) the full range of sounds, movements, and other sensory perceptions that come to us from the more than human world.” It’s hard to put a place that strikes us as sublime into mere words; we can try to describe it as a feeling and try to put language to that feeling, but sometimes the feeling of the beauty of nature or the power of a sacred space is too big to try to translate or make sense of. Would every place and experience be subjective, and would the discourse be the same? Would the mountain top make me feel the same as another? Or does my personal experience with the natural world and divine keep it intimate/ unique, or would my experience be relatable enough? The author uses the messiness, ambiguity, and mystery of people's deeply personal experience o...
Read more