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The Accidental Blessing Angela Johnson Quotes

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The Accidental Blessing Many people from all over the world deal with teen pregnancy every year. Teen pregnancy is talked about in many forms of writing. One book in specific that talks about the issues and problems that come with this is the first part last written by Angela Johnson. In this book, a boy named Bobby gets his girlfriend Nia pregnant while they are still in high school. Throughout the novel Bobby talks about the fun times and bad times leading up to his child being born while also explaining how good his life has been since that moment. Throughout the whole novel, Angela Johnson slips in little bits of symbolism to hint at Bobby coming of age and realizing that he needs to man up and take responsibility for his actions. …show more content…

Before Nia had the baby, a man by the name "Just Frank" would always ask Bobby if he was being a man. Bobby was thinking to himself one day that, "[Just Frank] never seemed to ask anybody else if they were being men... I didn't consider him much of one, a man, hangin' on the corner, drinking forties at ten in the morning" (Johnson 7). In this quote, Bobby basically says that he does not know why this guy only asks him if he was being a man when he is not really a man himself. A man in this scenario is considered to be strong and loyal during hard times like the one Bobby was experiencing. Bobby is walking out of the office, after making the decision to keep Feather, and he thinks that he saw "Just Frank," and he knew that he was being a man. Bobby knows that he was being a man and has become grown up when he thinks that he sees this random guy that died that would always ask him if he was being a man. This shows that Bobby has come of age by explaining that Bobby did not just get rid of the baby for his benefit, but he did the right thing even though he knew that it would be a challenge. In the beginning, Bobby did not even want the baby in the first place because he would miss out on a lot of fun, but in the end he made the right decision by keeping

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