The Messy Middle of Growing Up

A ceremony offers a definite moment: now you are a man, or woman, or more broadly an adult. But the transition to adulthood is rarely a single, clean step; more often, it is a series of stumbles. The following works explore the messy middle years, where childhood collides with the expectations of tradition, society, and self-identity. As you explore them, consider: is adulthood a destination you reach or a mask you learn to wear?

Gwendolyn Brooks | “We Real Cool” (1963)
Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve | “The Medicine Bag” (1975)
Carol Ann Duffy | “In Mrs. Tilscher’s Class” (1990)
Joss Whedon | “Where Do We Go From Here?” (2001)
Karen Russell | “Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves” (2006)
Ruth B | “Lost Boy” (2015)
Major Jackson | “Let Me Begin Again” (2021)

Every work — at a glance

We Real Cool — Gwendolyn Brooks (poem)

An eight-line 1960 poem spoken by seven pool players who skip school. Every sentence ends on 'We', left dangling at the line's edge, so the swagger sounds unmoored — and the last line lands: 'We / Die soon.'

+ 6 more works explained inside

What to know

01
How do these works treat the clean line a ceremony promises? None of them believe in it. Brooks's pool players swagger and die soon; Duffy's classroom tips from safety into knowledge in a single afternoon; Sneve's Martin is handed “The Medicine Bag” and must decide what to do with a heritage he was hiding. Growing up arrives as a series of stumbles.

+ 1 more insight inside

Across subjects

A Noh mask is carved almost expressionless on purpose. The actor tilts it down and it reads as grief, lifts it and it reads as joy — the face comes from the

Theme connection

"Are We There Yet?"

Is adulthood a destination you reach or a mask you learn to wear? Sneve's Martin arrives: he grows up by accepting the people he comes from. Russell's Claudette only passes, and knows it. Major Jackson's speaker offers a third answer — neither, just something you keep starting over and trying to get right.

Practice — a sample

SOCKaren Russell's wolf-girls are re-trained by nuns, stage by graded stage, to pass as human. Their situation is MOST like that of —

A Soldiers in basic drill
B Children learning to read
C Athletes in strict training
D Immigrants under assimilation pressure
E Patients in slow recovery

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