"The Star" by Alasdair Gray

This is a short story we analyzed in class last week. It features Cameron, a young boy who doesn't really fit in. At home, his parents don't seem to pay too much attention to him, and neither does it look like he has a good relationship with his brother. At school, he is bullied and insulted by his classmates, while his teacher appears as a distant and unsympathetic figure.

But everything changes when he finds a star in his backyard. Or is it a marble?

One way or the other, the discovery of that spheric object radically alters his life.

Some students may also have read John Banville's "The Music of the Sphere", and most are familiar with the fairy tale "The Princess and the Frog" (aka "The Frog King"). In both texts there are other characters that are also excesively attached to a spheric object.

How come spheres have this prominent role in literature? What could that mean?

Before you can answer those questions, maybe you could try and asnwer these other questions, as they might be easier.

Have you ever had an object that meant a lot to you, something you were not ready to part from? Have you ever thought that you owned something that had a tremendous importance in your life, even if it meant nothing for others?

Here's my challenge to you.

Can you think of a story in which there is a character that is obsessively and strangely attached to a spheric object, the way Cameron is?