Point of View. Point of view is the vantage point from which a story is told. If a story is told from a first-person point of view, the narrator uses the pronouns I and we and is a part of or a witness to the action. When a story is told from a third-person point of view, the narrator is outside the action; uses words such as he, she, it, and they; and avoids the use of I and we. As you read, note whether the point of view is first- or third-person.
Autobiography. An autobiography is the story of a person’s life, written by that person. The selection you are about to read is from Christopher Reeve’s autobiography entitled Still Me.
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• Christopher Reeve gained worldwide fame for his starring role in the Superman movies of the 1970s and 1980s. Born in 1952, Reeve’s life has been full of action, discipline, energy, and productivity. At age 13, he went to the McCarter Theater in Princeton, New Jersey, where he would play any part they would give to a kid. At 15, he was accepted by the Williamstown Theater Festival in Massachusetts. After graduating from Cornell University in 1974, he went on to study acting at Juilliard.
• On Memorial Day weekend, 1995, Reeve was competing in an equestrian event in Virginia. Without warning, his horse balked on the third jump, and Reeve, who had been riding at about 500 yards per minute, went flying over the horse’s head. His six-foot-four-inch, 215-pound body landed head first. In seconds he was paralyzed from the neck down, choking for air. Examination found that Reeve had broken his top two cervical vertebrae; fortunately, his head was intact and his brain stem appeared unharmed. Nine days later he was scheduled for a perilous operation to reconnect his skull to his spinal column.
Look over the following chart and fill in any facts about Reeve’s life that you already know. Then, as you read, notice what events and memories of Reeve’s life are covered in this section of his autobiography. Fill in what you have learned about Reeve and his life from this reading.
What part of your life would you most hate to lose due to a serious injury, and why?
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