Fever Finale

I really enjoyed reading Fever 1793 just as much as I loved Speak. It was full of suspense, foreshadowing, metaphors, similes, and had yet another great structure. There are examples of these craft moves strewn throughout the book. Subtle foreshadowing can be seen on page 148, "A small package thumped to the floor, but I didn't bother to examine it." This package is left alone and not referred to again until page 202, "I kicked something hard and hurt my toe. What could be on the floor? I got on my hands and knees and felt along the dark floor until I found a lump wrapped in a napkin." By doing this she clues in the reader that this item is special and important. It also creates suspense in the readers mind by not attending to the package until later, making the reader question what it could be.

I had no prior knowledge of the yellow fever and found that reading this book was a great way for me to really learn about history by immersing myself in it through the eyes of a young girl. This way of learning history is also great for getting different points of view or ideas of the time that you wouldn't have normally known or thought about. One such example of this in the book is the fact that many people in Philadelphia at the time of the outbreak thought that African Americans were immune. That is until they were sent to take care of the sick and caught it themselves. Instead of out right telling you this, Anderson puts you into it by making their cook a voluntary nurse later on in the book and having her family get sick and explain the whole thing to Mathilda from the African American perspective.

After finishing Fever 1793 I went online to look for interviews about the book and found something quite different but helpful nonetheless. What I found were many short films that were either mock previews for a movie on the book or short films summarizing the book. I also found many digital stories about the yellow fever. The thing that struck me most is that most of the remakes and previews were made by and starred elementary students. To me it is pretty apparent that some teacher used this in a lesson for the book. I think this is a great idea and makes it so students could make movies or digital stories to illustrate understanding for the book and history behind it. Here is a short movie made by children of Fever 1793 that I found is a good example of how it can be done: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wEtfb6_fMA&feature=related. 

And here is a shortened digital story telling about yellow fever that could easily be created just from the information gleaned out of the book by students: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFyu9Arjy-k.