English 11 Book Report
I. Introduction/General Information about the Book
•Title:The Green Mile
•Author: Stephen King
•Type of Book: Fiction
II. Characters
•Main Character
Paul Edgecomb - He is a person who is 108 years of age and has still an excellent health. Before, he was a corrections officer of Death Row inmates. He was responsible for the care, custody, and control of individuals who have been arrested and are awaiting trial while on remand or who have been convicted of a crime and sentenced to serve time in a prison or jail.
•I can identify the main character when:
I can identify the main character because the story focused on him from the start to the end. All the scenes in the film showed who the main character was.
•Supporting Characters
John Coffey
Eduard "Del" Delacroix
Percy Wetmore
•Describe some details about each supporting character
John Coffey - A 7'7, 515Ib African-American man convicted of raping and killing two young white girls who arrives on death row. He has supernatural healing powers.
Eduard "Del" Delacroix - The one who had his execution sabotaged and the only one who had his sponge dry for his execution
Percy Wetmore - He is the nephew of the governor's wife,a sadistic and unpopular guard. He was the one who sabotaged the execution of Del
III. Settings
•Describe the time and place of the story.
The setting of the story happened at Louisiana Cold Mountain Penitentiary in 1930's. The Louisiana Cold Mountain Penitentiary is a prison farm in Louisiana operated by the Department of Public Safety and Corrections. The prison is the largest maximum security prison in the United States with 5,000 inmates and 1,800 staff members. It is located on an 18,000 acre (73 km²) property that was previously the Angola and other plantations.
The setting really fits the story because story is all about the life of a corrections officer and the Death Row inmantes.
IV. Plot: The Action/Summary of What Happened in the Story
•Summary of the story
- In a Louisiana nursing home in 1999, Paul Edgecomb begins to cry while watching the movie Top Hat. His elderly friend, Elaine, shows concern for him and Paul tells her that the film reminded him of when he was a corrections officer in charge of Death Row inmates at Cold Mountain Penitentiary during the summer of 1935.
- One day, John Coffey, a 7'7, 515Ib African-American man convicted of raping and killing two young white girls arrives on death row. Coffey demonstrates all the characteristics of being 'developmentally challenged': keeping to himself, fearing darkness, and being moved to tears on occasion. Soon enough, John reveals extraordinary powers by healing Paul's urinary tract infection and resurrecting a mouse. Later, he would heal the terminally-ill wife of Warden Hal Moores, who suffered from a large brain tumor. When John is asked to explain his power, he merely says that he "took it back."
- At the same time, Percy Wetmore, a sadistic and unpopular guard, starts work. He "knows people, big people" (he is the nephew of the governor's wife), in effect preventing Paul or anybody else from doing anything significant to curb his behavior. Percy recognizes that the other officers greatly dislike him and uses that to demand managing the next execution. After that, he promises, he will have himself transferred to an administrative post at Briar Ridge Mental Hospital and Paul will never hear from him again. An agreement is made, but Percy then deliberately sabotages the execution. Instead of wetting the sponge, used to conduct electricity and make executions quick and effective, he leaves it dry, causing inmate Eduard "Del" Delacroix's execution to be botched.
- Shortly before Del's execution, a violent prisoner named William "Wild Bill" Wharton arrives, due to be executed for multiple murders committed during a robbery. At one point he seizes John's arm and John psychically senses that Wharton is the true killer of the two girls, the crime for which John was convicted and sentenced to death. John "takes back" the sickness in Hal's wife and regurgitates it into Percy, who then shoots Wharton to death and falls into a permanent catatonic state. Percy is then housed in the Briar Ridge Mental Hospital. In the wake of these events, Paul interrogates John, who says he "punished them bad men" and offers to show Paul what he saw. John takes Paul's hand stating that he has to give Paul "a part of himself" in order to see and imparts the visions of what he saw, of what really happened to the girls.
- Paul asks John what he should do, if he should open the door and let John walk away, but John tells him that he is ready to die because here there is too much pain in the world, which he is aware of and sensitive to, stating that he is "rightly tired of the pain" and is ready to rest. When John is put in the electric chair, he asks Paul not to put the traditional black hood over his head because he is afraid of the dark. Paul agrees and after Paul shakes his hand, John is executed.
- As Paul finishes his story, he notes that he requested a transfer to a youth detention center, where he spent the remainder of his career. Elaine questions his statement that he had a fully-grown son at the time and Paul explains that he was 44 years old at the time of John's execution and that he is now 108 and still in excellent health. This is apparently a side effect of John giving a "part of himself" to Paul. Mr. Jingles, Del's mouse resurrected by John, is also still alive — but Paul believes his outliving all of his relatives and friends to be a punishment from God for having John executed. Paul explains he has deep thoughts about how "we each owe a death; there are no exceptions; but, Oh God, sometimes the Green Mile seems so long." Paul is left wondering, if Mr. Jingles has remained alive for all of this time being but a mouse, how long will it be before his own death?
V. Theme
•What is the author trying to say in the story? Is there a moral in the story?
The moral in the story is that we should not judge a book by its cover. Like what happened in the story, John Coffey was convicted of rape and murder. He had to die because of something that he did not do which is really unfair.
•This book showed me/I learned from this story:
We should know every person's story.
•State a problem in the story and how it was solved
Paul Edgecomb suffered from urinary tract infection but with the help of John Coffey, Paul Edgecomb's condition was back to normal.
VI. Evaluation of the Book
•What are your thoughts about the book? (did you or didn't you like it and why?)
The story is very nice. It is very inspiring but at the same time it makes me feel sad because of the reality shown in the film wherein people who are supposed to be innocent are the ones suffering the consequence of others' bad actions.
