Best American - The Encirclement

The Construction Zone:

The Encirclement by Tamas Dobozy

Summary:

Blind wanderer, Sandor, makes his way around America on the charity and kindness of strangers eager to aid him. He follows Professor Teleki, an historian and lecturer who travels and shares his experiences during the war. However, every time Teleki begins to talk, he is interrupted by the blind man, who accuses him of lying to his audience, and the audience, eager to hear what the blind man has to say, urge him to continue in his accusations. Sandor’s claims of Teleki’s dishonesty become nation-known, and as Sandor’s stories are so specifically detailed, and told with such conviction, the nation believes him over Teleki. Teleki decides to end his tour and hide from the ridicule of the horrific, unjust accusations, but before doing so, he holds one more lecture. It is here, during Sandor’s final, most convincing speech, that Teleki realizes the man is speaking of his own experiences. He descends from the stage and finds the man who is not physically blind, but morally, and hugs him before escorting him from the auditorium, from his own public confession.

Teleki realizes that Sandor, who travelled across the country on other’s good will, also confesses his sins on the good will of others. He realizes that Teleki allows others to help him so that they may help themselves, as Sandor learned to help and forgive himself as well.

Themes:

Self discovery

Forgiveness of others; path to forgiveness of yourself

Blind “wise” man

Death and rebirth

Coexisting

War

Destruction

Sacrifice

Relationships

Learning from others

Learning about yourself from others

Activities:

Running with the idea of learning from other’s experiences, we could brainstorm within small groups when this may be beneficial, and share personal our experiences. As an entire class, we could talk about characters in a novel we are reading: how do they learn or do not learn, when perhaps they should, from one another. A critical question to build the activity around may be, “can we truly learn from others, or is it our own experience we need to finalize our understanding?” Have students write a 2 page short story about a time they thought they were able to understand someone’s situation, but it wasn’t until they experienced it for themselves that they were truly able to understand. As a class, discuss some of the reasons which prevented them from understanding this other person. Was it fear? Lack of a willingness to step out of one’s comfort zone? Social implications? Even though we may not truly understand someone’s situation, can we still learn from it? What is the difference between the two?

• Group discussion


• Class discussion


• Story about own experience to get students to consider why/what the difference is between fully understanding someone’s experience, and having the ability to learn and apply someone else’s experiences to ones on life


• Regroup as class – discuss difference between “understanding” and “learning”