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Final Draft

Jan 3, 2012

Stargirl Dynamic Characters Essay

By Veronica 

Stargirl is a dynamic character because she changes throughout the story. In the beginning, she is weird and stands out from the crowd. By the end of the story, she has the choice of who she wants to be and who she really is.  In the first paragraph, I’ll prove that she is a unique character. The second paragraph is about how Stargirl tries to fit in for Leo and how this affects her. Then, in the third paragraph, we learn if Stargirl was even accepted at the end, and who she decided to be. Stargirl is a weird, yet, kind, teenage girl. For instance, it’s a normal day at Mica Area High School, the place is sunny and crowded. You look down the hall into the cafeteria and see chaos, and in the middle of it all is a girl with a long pioneer skirt, strumming a ukulele, singing, “Happy Birthday!” to a poor red-faced ninth grader. This is Stargirl.

Stargirl is the exact opposite of the definition regular. She carries a rat instead of a dog with her. She wears long, flowy pioneer skirts instead of tight, short miniskirts, and she strangely knows more about you than you do about yourself. She sings, she sings in the halls and in the cafeterias. Stargirl lives in her own world. She follows her own dress code and “people rules”, “She wore an off-white dress so long it covered her shoes. It had ruffles around the neck and cuffs and looked like it could have been her great grandmother’s wedding gown.” (pg. 4) Will she change because of a boy or stay true to herself?

Stargirl is proud and happy with herself, but becomes less confident with this choice everyday that Leo convinces her to become normal. Stargirl shows up to school in in jeans, sandals, had burnt- red nails, and lipstick, painted eyes, all kinds of rings and humongous hoop earrings. She changed her behavior, and wore what she hated the most. She didn’t sing, she didn’t carry a rat or even a ukulele. Stargirl was gone, and instantly replaced with Susan. Susan became sadder and sadder with every passing day, pretending to be a regular girl. “She looked magnificently, wonderfully, gloriously ordinary.”(p. 139&140) Stargirl was confused and hurt that Leo liked Susan better. Should she change back and leave Leo or choose to be sad and have Leo and the crowd like her. Would she be accepted then?

Even though she melted into the crowd, Stargirl still stuck out, and so she was never accepted. She would always be different and people didn’t like that, they never accepted her fully. After seeing the real Stargirl, they would never accept her again no matter how much she changed. Her father got a job offer far away from Arizona in Pennsylvania. She took this as a chance to become herself again, even if people didn’t accept her. If people in her new town would like her, they were going to like her as Stargirl and only Stargirl. She showed up at the final dance before she left on a bike covered with flowers in a beautiful buttercup dress. Everyone stared and stayed a distance away as she danced with herself. A little while later, all you could see were people scrambling to cling on to someone else’s back and do the bunny hop…with Stargirl as the leader. People might never fully accept Stargirl, but they could at least have fun and treat fairly. Stargirl might never be normal, but at least she’s happy with it that way. By the end of the book, Stargirl learns many valuable life lessons.

She learned to be herself, or people might like her for someone she’s not. Stargirl took chances and was kind to everybody, and she was happy all the time. Teenagers never do random acts of kindness and they always try to fit in with the crowd instead of trying to be their selves… and they are never very happy. Why do you think the world thinks it’s weird to do acts of kindness or start singing when you want to? In Stargirl’s world it’s weird to walk down a hall and not stop and compliment someone or start friendly chats. Why is this normal in our world?