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Night John
By Lisa Likens

In this essay I will tell you why an education is important to me. Why it was important to Sarny and Charlie Gordon. I will also compare Charlie Gordon and Sarnys' wants for an education. An education is very important to me and I think to a lot of people because everyone wants to be intelligent and have some self-value.
An education is very important to me to have because I think that that would be very embarrassing not even being able to read or write. I want to be highly educated. Reading and writing gives me self-value, if I could not read I would not think of myself as anything much. I think that everyone should be able to read because it lets your mind soar. Reading will let you be at any place in the universe at any time or you can be any person in the whole world. Reading also gives you something to do and think about while your working or plainly being bored.
I think that getting an education was important to Sarny because she also wanted to have some self-value. The white people treated them like animals, many of them lost their emotions and their self-value, they did not care whether or not they lived or died. Sarny wanted some self-value. She also needed her mind to be thinking of something while working, when your reading books your mind goes in a special place where you can think about anything or be anyone. The white people did not want the African Americans to learn how to read because they were afraid that they would start getting ideas and thinking. The white people also did not want them to have any self-value, they were afraid that they would think of themselves as real human beings.
I think Charlie Gordon wanted to get an education because he felt dumb. All his life all he ever wanted was to be smart. He also (like Sarny) wanted some self-value. Sarny and Charlie lived in two very different times and places, but they both felt worthless because they could not read or write and to them that was very important and it is still very important.
In conclusion I think that it is very important for everyone to read or write, it helps to shape your mind. For me getting an education is very important. If I could not read or write like Sarny couldn't then I know that I would feel worthless. Sarny and Charlie Gordon felt that they needed to know how to read and write, well they learned either by an operation or just crackin the old books and after they learned they felt good.