Offence Taken

In the style of Sally Jackson

She was hugging her stack of books and walking through the corridor, trying not to get in anyone's way as per usual.

She was walking by the English sector where a bunch of frustrated looking students were walking out of the lower level class.

"I hate Literature," one guy said. He was in Sally's biology class- well, he was when he showed up. "I mean, it's so useless. What kind of a freak just reads book after book and analyses like that?"

Sally spun around.

"Hey!" She cried.

The guy turned and looked at her stunned.

She took the first book from her stack. "This here is a William Shakespeare anthology containing three of his comedies- The Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Two Gentlemen of Verona. This man wrote these plays in the 1500's and we don't even know who he is or if he even was a real person, but we still read his stories because they are amazing and so relevant to this day."

She pulled up another book. "This is The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas Père. I have Les Misérables by Victor Hugo in my bag. These books were written in French. I don't speak French and neither do millions of people in the world, but these stories were so good that someone sat down and translated every word one by one just to give those millions of people a chance to read them. And those millions of people did, and loved them."

Sally pulled up another book. "This is Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie. It's a children's book, but it's such a fantastic adventure and setting that scholars are studying it as we speak and movies are being made."

The next one was Pride and Prejudice. "This is all about how your morality is influenced by your upbringing and I can tell you that there are people who spend their nights reading these stories to try and figure out what that said about them. I know because I've done it, and I know that if I hadn't read this book I'd be an entirely different person most likely for the worst.

"White Fang isn't even narrated by a human, but the world was written so unbelievably realistically and the world is so exciting and new that we read it still.

She dropped her bag and pulled out the biggest tome she was carrying.

"This book was written by a man who invented a language, an alphabet and cultures within a world as well as their pasts and interactions for the sake of a story that is taking the world by storm even fifty something years after it's gotten published," she said holding up J.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings.

She pulled out another book.

"This is The Diary of Anne Frank. This girl wrote about the single most horrific war in human history in the form of a diary. She wanted to be a writer and write real books and real articles when she grew up, but she never got the chance to because she was killed by the Nazis for no good reason at all. And now look. She's dead, but her talent was so prominent, so recognised and her story was such a good and important one to tell that even if she's dead she's a writer we all know. Her dream came true. And clearly it mattered to her, which is why it matters to so many people. Because Anne Frank is so real and palpable and gifted in imagery that way." Sally said.

She picked up her backpack and stuffed her book inside, without paying attention to the looks she was getting. She straightened up.

"And by the way, I'm going to study English lit when I graduate. So watch what you say because that was offensive and offence was taken." Sally said. She noticed the looks. Shock, puzzlement, worry even. Her cheeks flushed red.

"Holy smokes," he said. "I thought you were deaf mute."

He extended his hand.

"Hello, my name is Oliver."

Sally blushed fiercely to the root of her hair and shook his hand. Her shyness was back.

She hated how she only came out of her shell when she had to yell to someone about something worth it.