love for literature

By Cari Rodriguez

Every school year, we have English. We have chill teachers, strict teachers, teachers who overwork you, and then some teachers want to talk more about the world and anything that wasn't taught in their time. One teacher that stands out to me is Sophie Gilbert.

Long before becoming a teacher, Gilbert lived in a small agricultural town. It was like being in the middle of the country and the city.

Gilbert: “I'm originally from a small town in Illinois called Granite city. Which is not far from St. Louis, Missouri. And it's very agricultural in the area, a lot of corn. So it's kind of, not exactly in the country, but not exactly far from it."

Gilbert’s love for reading and literature began at a young age. Her parents were readers, and they encouraged her to read. They took her to the library, and from there on, she challenged herself to keep reading books that were more difficult every time. She would ask her parents for their favorite books growing up and read them.

Gilbert: "Since I was a kid. My mother, my parents, Yeah. My mother especially was a reader. Well, both my parents were readers, And they would take me to my mother would take me to the library to get books and. Really encouraged reading and so I've always known books growing up and a lot of times you get that from your parents. You know your parents. If your parents are readers, chances are you're going to be a reader too, and cause they model it for you and. They told me about books they really enjoyed, so I started reading more and more. And one thing led to another. Very early on when I was maybe 10 or 12. I started reading an author called Agatha Christie, who's a mystery writer in England. I had seen the 1974 film murder on the Orient Express. Started becoming interested in Agatha Christie. She wrote over 80 books. Mysteries, and they're pretty easy to read. They're not too difficult for a young reader. And then one that was more difficult than it started when I was, I think, like in fifth grade I started reading Sherlock Holmes. And show up holme stories. And. Just kind of went from there but you start simple and you work your way up to something more challenging. Sherlock Holmes is more older, so the language is more difficult, but I enjoyed those stories too very much."

Years later Gilbert decided to move out from her hometown to California because her hometown was full of white people. There was no diversity. She also loves the Bay area. She wanted to see more than what she saw in her hometown.

Gilbert: “More opportunities, other places. I like the Bay Area. I like the diversity here where I'm from. It was all white, all homogeneous, all the same and I've always wanted to know more to see more to experience more. And the only way to do that was to leave where I was from and start traveling around and. Interacting with people and seeing new things and new ways of doing things.”

When living in Fresno, Gilbert would participate in plays. She was curious about that experience and she ended up going for more plays. She landed background character roles and even got a big role one time. Her favorite play was a comedy that she landed a big role in.

Gilbert: "I came to Fresno. Some years ago and they had a Shakespeare in the park kind of thing. It's called Woodward Shakespeare festival. They were announcing auditions and I couldn't stop thinking about it. And I thought, well. I've never done this before. I would like to try it. And I was nervous, really nervous, like was shaking. I was so nervous going to the audition and I got a roll. It was a very small role, but I got a role in the merchant of Venice. And then after that I participated in two other seasons of the Shakespeare Festival in Fresno. And then I started when I came to San Jose. I found a church had a theater group and.They were doing the twilight zone episodes from the twilight zone. The classic episodes. They did Sherlock Holmes. They did. Play called I'm not Rappaport which is about New York and Jewish,a Jewish person who's elderly living in New York and keeps butting into things he shouldn't, but into and things like that so. And it was a male character, but we did it as women. The two leads. I Just have fun with it. I enjoy it.I take it seriously to a point, but I do it more for fun and for the enjoyment of it. I don't think I'd want to do it professionally because it's too stressful. But I enjoy as long as I enjoy it, I'll keep doing it. I So that was fun. And I also enjoyed that I'm not Rappaport cause I played the lead. That was my first time playing for a really long time. Role where I was on stage almost the entire show. And it was very stressful, but I did it and I enjoyed the character very much."

Gilbert loved the plays, but she also loved traveling. She has been to so many places I can't even name them all. She can’t even choose a favorite but she talked so much about it. She is also traveling with her daughter to England.

Gilbert: "Canada and Mexico. England, Wales and Scotland. Russia. The Philippines, Thailand. And Japan. Uhm? I'm torn between 2. I really enjoyed London, London, England. And I also really enjoyed Bangkok, Thailand, Bangkok. Is almost like a playground, sort of. It's very colorful. And there's so much to do and see there they have a floating market. They have all the Buddhist temples. And there's a lot of gold and a lot of really cool things to see. And the palace also in Bangkok is really stunning."

Teaching was never in Gilbert's plan. It sort of came out of nowhere when she had to teach one time and from there she just kept going.

Gilbert: “ I don't think I really wanted to be a teacher until I actually taught a class. I was in grad school and to pay for it I was able to do what's called an assistantship, that involves some teaching and so it wasn’t until I actually taught in a classroom. That I actually understood that it was meant to be. That I really wanted to do it.”

Now she loves to teach because she gets to learn and improve on how she presents her topics. It's like everyday she teaches something new and in every period there's always a different response from students.

Gilbert: It's never the same day twice. Even though I'm teaching the same thing over and over, a lot of the time. You get different responses and you can be creative in how you present things and always look into new things. How to present this or that better or. You know trying different things, just trying out different things, experimenting with it. Teaching lends to that very well to that creativity. You know, there's always new challenges, new things, and also when you see. Responses from students that they understand things you know it, just it hooked me.

Gilbert's room has a lot of rainbows and lgbtq+ stuff hung up. It's very accepting. The reason she has them hung up and has a lot of Lgbtq+ hung up is because she tries her best to help the community. She’s known friends that have got very mistreated due to them being a part of the community and some have even gotten killed.

Gilbert: Well, I know quite a few people. In the LGBTQ+ community and. I've done what I can to help people in the LGBTQ+ community and. So that's partly why 'cause I know a lot. I know a lot of the Community, especially when I was in Fresno, not so much here, but in Fresno, like I kind of got into it so. You know there's. It's kind of a tight knit group in Fresno. Very tight knit group, but it's more conservative there so they have more of a like kind of a battle, you know. And I knew someone who was killed. Someone who was attacked and so on and so forth. When I was in Fresno so I've been exposed to. A lot of the trials and difficulties of. Of people in the LGBTQ+ community, so that's that's why I care a lot about them.