Blog Post #3

          Before the book, Where She Went, even starts, there is part of a poem, which I found interesting. I began wondering why the Gayle Forman would incorporate another author's work into her own, so I looked into it. The poem reads, "It well may be that in a difficult hour, / Pinned down by pain and moaning for release, / Or nagged by want past resolution's power, / I might be driven to sell your love for peace, / Or trade the memory of this night for food. / It well may be. I do not think I would" (Edna St. Vincent Millay).
          As I read this poem, I first started thinking about how this could possibly relate to the book, but as I looked at it more and more I began to see the relationship. In the poem, it mentions a 'difficult hour' which we can relate to the time period of Mia being in the hospital, which would be difficult for both Mia and Adam. Also, when the poem mentions, 'I might be driven to sell your love for peace, / Or trade the memory of this night for food. / It well may be. I do not think I would', I take this to mean that since Adam is currently away from Mia, in New York, and has a celebrity girlfriend, and even though Mia is part of 'his past', he would not give up those memories and experiences for anything. Which I think is pretty cool.
          I think that Gayle Forman included this poem in the start of her book to show a bit of how Adam is feeling, before the book even starts. To be perfectly honest, I do not usually read the beginning pages of a book, and I would assume that I am not alone on that. It makes me wonder if there something meaningful like this, whether it be a poem or a phrase in many other books, and if so, then maybe I should stop and read it more often.

This is the full version of the poem that was mentioned.