Woodsong

Woodsong

by Gary Paulsen

To be honest, I wasn't quite in love with this book from the start like I thought I would be. But I think it won me over in the end. Woodsong is a memoir of Gary Paulsen's life, that features the lessons he learned as a woodsman and his experience running a team of sled dogs in the epic Iditarod race. For me, the first few chapters were very slow, and the bloody descriptions were painful. However, things started to pick up for me when I read the account of one of the dogs, Columbia, teasing another, Olaf by pushing his bone incredibly close, but just out of his reach, and how this action and focus on the humor felt by the dominant party led Paulsen to quit trapping animals. In class, we've recently been discussing author's craft and leads into stories. I loved how not just the first line of the book, but every chapter really, had an intriguing lead in this book. For example, chapter one: "I understood almost nothing about the woods until it was nearly too late. And that is strange because my ignorance was based on knowledge." And chapter four: "The adventure really begins in differences--the great differences between people and animals, between the way we live now and the way we once lived, between the Mall and the Woods." In relation to this second lead in particular, Paulsen goes on to discuss how the difference between animals and people is fire. Not technology or resources or physical ability, but fire. I also really enjoyed that his memoir was not just about his life story, but truly focused on lessons, which makes it perfect to read in an educational context. In addition, I feel that the lessons he learns don't just teach him about his life, but can be applied in other contexts as well. For example, I think the most important lesson he learns, that he learns from a 400-pound bear who could have easily killed him after Paulsen threw a stick at him but chose not to, is that "when it is all boiled down I am nothing more and nothing less than any other animal in the woods." I think this lesson applies to Paulsen's life but is also a good moral for children in general, meaning that they are no better than any of their peers and no better than the other creatures on this earth and thus should not destroy them. I will admit that some of the content in this book is very sensitive for elementary age, and I was shocked in horror and upset by some of the scenes he described. But he did also have a sense of humor in describing the animals that kept me entertained throughout.

The description of the Iditarod was kind of presented as a separate portion of the book, and its exhilarating, much more active tone, certainly separated it so. I was shocked to learn that the race takes seventeen days, and cannot imagine something more grueling and consuming, but also rewarding in the end. I think the feeling he describes of The Run being something that can't be done, but once you do it, you never want it to end, may not be a feeling that children can relate to right now, but I have full confidence that later in life it is a feeling they will experience and hopefully will be able to relate back to this moment in the book.

Paulsen answers questions submitted by children to Scholastic!

http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/iditarod/top_mushers/index.asp?article=gary_paulsen