Where would she be?

The language in Push showed signs of Precious’ illiteracy even before she mentioned that all of the pages in her math book looked the same. Most of the words were spelled incorrectly and grammatical errors were ubiquitous. In the beginning, her anger which was heavily emphasized by profanity, was not just a result of her troubles at home but also the frustration of being trapped and surrounded by a world of failure.

The pregnancy of her second child, although a result of rape, resulting in expulsion from school actually saved her. She recognized that she was overweight and compared herself to her morbidly obese mother whom she estimated to be at least three hundred pounds. She resented her mother for being ignorant and cruel and Precious saw herself in her mother if she did not change something now. Precious would be living with her mother while being beaten and raped every night resulting in more pregnancies while on welfare until someone would unfortunately die if she did not leave and start her own life.

Precious was a sixteen-year-old eighth grader who did not have many friends and despite her intimidating façade, was scared and self-conscious to the point of incontinency (as a child). Her defiant attitude towards school and the Teach One Each One program almost kept her from meeting Ms. Rain and her classmates but after Ms. Rain’s calloused method of teaching leveled Precious’ bullying, she was tamed into wanting to go to school and write in her journal. Eventually, after learning to read and write she sees the new students with the same insolent mind-set she once had and for the first time in the book, was happy and enthusiastic because she tested as reading and writing at an eighth grade level.