I am reading Golden Girl, by Michael Silver, which is the biography of Natalie Coughlin. Natalie Coughlin is an Olympic gold medalist swimmer, and her biography tells the story of how she got so far in the sport. One theme that has already been shown in the book is how a negative attitude can lead to unfortunate consequences. In her teenage years, she swam with a swim team she ended up not liking very much. The coach of the team was verbally abusive to the girls on the team, sometimes telling them “You girls are fat… you need to watch what you are eating” (Silver 31). This negatively affected the swimmers. Many girls got eating disorders, or simply quit the sport they loved because of it. Natalie hated the criticism, and it made her move teams.
Another example of how negative criticism affected her was when an older swimmer, Staciana Stitts on her college team tried to get inside Natalie’s head. The swimmer, who older than Natalie, and jealous of her swimming abilities said to her “You’re not a team player” (Silver 20). The criticism affected Natalie greatly. Natalie began hating to go to swim practice because of Stitts. It also affected Natalie’s swimming, and made her go slower times.
Silver, Michael. Golden Girl. Rodale Inc. Michael Silver. 2006.
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This seems like a goo dpick of a book for you and it sounds intense. I think oyur theme that negative attitudes can lead to unfortunate circumstances is very gopod and the fact that Natalie's times slowed is a great support to your theme. I also think that the coaching is a bit crazy about them calling the girls "fat". I wonder how that negativity affected her but seeing as she is a gold medalist in the Olympics I assume it didn't hole her back.
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