↓ Transcript
(Emily and Zoe are in class, idly listening to their teacher talk.)
Teacher:
... His colleagues resent him for killing himself, as though he was selfish. It’s a fairly selfish thing, suicide. It might just be the most selfish thing a person can do, because you remove a whole person from the world.
(Emily looks up.)
Teacher (behind her on the board is written 'The Family Man' p61): You don’t face your problems; you leave all the people around you grieving. It takes more strength to hang on and keep going, and taking your life is the weaker option – I mean, we all have challenges in our lives. But is that the nature of suicide, that it is selfish? The writer writes this way for a reason, he doesn’t just write a poem in half an hour, he goes back over it over and over again. So his language choice is really important. He takes on a negative attitude towards the act itself, rather than focussing on the grief left behind.
(Emily sneaks a sideways glance at Zoe, who is subtly concealing her face. A teardrop falls on Zoe's open workbook.)
Teacher:
And for your piece, I’d warn you against trying to take the persona of someone contemplating suicide, because it’s just like all those ‘Mean Girls’ stories that everyone does – it’s going to end up really cliché. And you’re not really going to be able to understand what would drive someone to suicide, anyway, so you’re not going to be able to convey that mind-set.
(Emily smacks her hands on the table.)
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Alt text:
Nothing in my comic is based specifically on real life, except this one monologue which my teacher did actually say.