Topic > Analysis of Rhetorical Devices in Superman and Me by Sherman Alexie

Superman and Me is a memoir written by Sherman Alexie in 1998. It talks about Sherman's childhood and how reading a Superman comic had a impact on his life. Sherman Alexie is a writer who comes from Native American culture and did not have a bright future. He believes that not only will reading books help a student learn, but it will save their life. Alexie uses pathos to draw the reader in by calling himself a “little Indian boy” in his story who teaches himself to read at an early age and learns quickly. He doesn't consider himself a genius but considers himself the little Indian boy who can read and was able to improve his reading skills due to his passion for books and literature. Alexie “read books late into the night” until he “could barely keep” his “eyes open.” The relationship between Alexie and literature was so powerful that it was as if paper and glue were stuck together. His emotion tells the reader how reading might affect him and Sherman Alexie is a victim of that influence. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Another rhetorical device Alexie uses is hyperbole. “Our house was full of books. They were stacked in crazy piles in the bathroom, bedrooms and living rooms. A house filled with thousands of books in every room would be a madhouse. He is trying to say that he had so many books to read and is creating a picture for the reader's mind to visualize how many books he has read. This also shows how he grew up reading in his childhood life. The more books he read, the more he saved his life by learning knowledge from reading texts. Alexie disguises himself as the unfortunate little Indian boy in his story to show his audience who he really is, and this is an example of personality. He wants the public to know that unfortunate Indian boy lived with the expectation of being unsophisticated and unsocial at school due to the environment in which he lived. Throughout his story, he disguises the boy as a child willing to learn. reading every book he had in his hands and reading until he could barely keep his eyes open. The little Indian boy was saving himself from the destitute life he lived by learning to read comics in sentences, sentences in paragraphs, paragraphs in paragraphs, and several paragraphs in a book containing more and more pages to read until his eyes were ready to be closed and be open again to read more. This childhood memoir Superman and Me contains rhetorical devices such as pathos, hyperbole, and characters to connect to Sherman Alexie's perspective on education. There are many children who cannot attend school due to the poor environment in which they live and which does not guarantee them any education. Environments like the ones Alexie lived in in his childhood can influence those children into a path that will provide them not with a future, but a future full of unfortunate events to struggle with in life. Reading can change a person's life and even save their life. Alexie showed the reader that he did not let his stereotype or the environment he lived in affect his future. He proves that any Native American can succeed, not only Native Americans, but many ethnicities around the world can succeed like he did. Alexie will always give credit to the Superman comic book that helped him learn to read on his own and from that day it started saving his life.