City Of Bones-Equality

I am currently reading City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. The book is set in our world, but living among us are Demons, Downworlders and Shadowhunters. Demons are creatures of pure evil. Downworlders (Warlocks, Vampires, Werewolves and Fairies) are part Demon and part human. Shadowhunters are humans with a small amount of angel blood who are charged with protecting the earth from Demons. In the book, one of the big issues is about equality. Some Shadowhunters believe they are better then Downworlders.

The antagonist of the story, Valentine, believes that Shadowhunters are the superior race and all Downworlders should be eliminated. This really brings up the question, can one race really be better then another? The Shadow hunters believe that because they have the blood of angels they are better then half-breed Downworlders. They don’t see that they themselves are half-breeds; they have just been around longer. What gives them the right to say that Shadowhunters are better then the Downworlders? What gives Valentine the right to decide who is aloud to live on this earth? No one has that power.

One of Valentines core beliefs was that by fraternizing with Downworlders, Shadowhunters are tainting their race. He believes in the purity of the Shadowhunters. This particular belief reminds me of racism in the south. Many white people believed that mixing with African Americans tainted the purity of the white race. Some people said that if the two races had children together it would lead to the “mongrelization” of the white race. They believed that African Americans are somehow born as less then whites.

            Whenever one race considers themselves superior to another, death and destruction almost always follow. This is because we shouldn’t be classifying people based on what they are but on who they are. All people are born equal. In this book and the world people need to learn this.           

          

Perspective in Thirteen Reasons Why

At first, it is hard to tell which perspective is missing from Thirteen Reasons Why.  If you look really closely you can tell though. Hannah’s perspective is missing.  Hannah is a girl who has recently committed suicide. Clay, who has had a crush on Hannah almost as long as he has known her, comes home one day to find a package filled with tapes and no return address on the doorstep. When he plays the tapes he hears a dead girl’s voice on the speakers. She tells him that if he has received the tapes, he is one of the reasons she killed herself.

 Clay’s perspective is clearly present, the book is told from his point of view. At the same time, Hannah narrates almost the entire book through the tapes. But you only hear what she chooses to say. You hear how she is really feeling. It is only what Clay hears.

            Excluding Hannah’s voice has a really interesting effect on the story.  For one it really emphasizes how the people receiving the tape feel. If the author had just told it to us as Hannah recorded it, it would not have the same impact. The impact is also increased when we don’t know who will be next and what they did. It makes everything more of a shock.

            Whenever we hear stories about harassment or bullying, we usually hear it from the point of view of the victim or occasionally the bully. What is so interesting about this is that we are hearing it from a person who cared about the victim, so he isn’t neutral, but was never mean to her. In fact, Clay was sent the tapes because he had been nice to her once. That was the only time he really spoke to her though. Other then this one interaction, he was a bystander. It gives an interesting perspective on what happened. When she refers to “everyone else” he gives insight as to whether or not people really thought that. He also beats himself up for not stepping in and for believing every rumor he heard. This is something we don’t hear very often.

            Excluding Hannah’s perspective sends a really powerful message. It is about not watching as other people are bullied, teased or harassed. One person has the power to stop it. Everyone likes Clay. If he had said stop, people probably would have.  You can’t just stand by and watch. You have to take a stand.

Behemoth- How Many Lives?

Behemoth, by Scott Westerfeld, has some political powers moving the plot along. Then again, that makes sense considering the fact that the book is an alternate version of World War I. The difference between Behemoth’s war and ours is when Darwin has discovered evolution and DNA as well. Europe has become divided between the Clankers (Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire) and the Darwinists (England, France and Russia). The war has mostly to do with power, and whose ideas are better. Throughout the book, the question is asked, how many individual lives are worth the welfare of a nation?  

What the major countries in Europe did was unacceptable. There was no justice in it. The war can be brought to an end, but how will that make it right with the families who lost members to the war? There is no comfort in, your child died because the Ottomans can’t decide whether they like England. The rulers of many of the countries involved didn’t even think about the people they were killing. They were fighting to win a game. It was like chess. If one pawn is captured it’s not the end of the world, they are just one of eight, a number. They are pieces to move around. If there is a strategy and if that involves sacrificing a pawn to capture a bishop, then so be it. What’s worse is that they are playing for TV privileges and bragging rights, things that no one besides those in power really care about. There is no justice in playing a game with peoples lives.

There are also smaller situations in the book where people die but the reason is more sincere. When Alek and Deryn help a rebellion in the Ottoman Empire, soldiers on both sides are killed as well as people who had nothing to do with it. The Ottomans are ridding themselves of a terrible sultan as well as saving the crew of the Leviathan, an airship. On the other hand, they are taking lives from real people. The rebels, of course, believe that is okay. Their deaths are for a just cause. But is a revolution really worth these people’s lives? That is a question more difficult to answer.

This particular situation made me think of the bombing of Hiroshima, during World War II. The United States dropped an atom bomb on Japan in order to end a war they feared would drag on. They killed huge numbers of people. They resulted in radiation and caused diseases for years to come. At the same time, if the United States had allowed the war to continue, no one knows how many more lives could have been lost. This is a “what if” situation where no one really knows what the “right” answer is.

In a perfect world the answer to the question how many lives are worth the welfare of a nation would have the simple answer of none. In some cases, like the general war in Behemoth this is the answer. But in some cases there is more of a moral grey area. Either way a life is never expendable. 

Leviathan: Personal Identity vs. Predetermined Destiny

In the book Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld, Deryn Sharp, one of the two main characters, is a girl who leaves her life behind to masquerades as a boy and joins the English air force. Alek, the other main character, begins the book as the son of an archduke who will not inherit his father’s title due to his mother’s common blood. His world is turned upside down when his father is killed. He is taken away to Switzerland and then discovers that the his lack of title, the only thing that defined him, is actually inaccurate and that he is the heir to the Austro-Hungarian empire These characters are very different but are both controlled by extreme aspects of their lives.

I think the main theme of this book is about personal identity verses a predetermined destiny. Deryn leaves the life expected of her, the life of a girl, behind. Alek is obsessed with his political destiny. They both change though the book as Deryn begins to have feelings for Alek, and Alek starts to develop a personality, outside of politics when he helps the stranded crew of the Leviathan, Deryn’s ship.

            Neither character needs to completely shun their destinies or their identities. Deryn can be a girl and a pilot. The same goes for Alek. He can be a ruler and have be his own person outside of politics. This is something that by the end of the book the characters were beginning to realize. (It’s a series.) Deryn starts the book being defined by who she is. She doesn’t care that she is a girl. Alek enters the book in the opposite situation. His life is defined by his rank, or lack of rank. Both characters need to find a middle ground where they can accept who they are, while hold onto what they are.

Finding out who we are is important. This doesn’t mean we need to throw out what we are. We should be able to embrace both. Choosing one or the other is like trying to live using only one half of the body. While it is possible, to truly prosper, we need both.

           

Conformity- Is it Right or Wrong?

In a Wrinkle in Time I noticed conformity is a huge issue. In the beginning of the book Meg wants more then anything for people to like her, and to fit in. At the same time she is incredibly stubborn, refusing to do her work the same way as everyone else. After Meg’s trip to Camazots, a world where everyone does exactly the same thing all of the time and doesn’t think for themselves, and her encounter with IT, a deformed brain that attempts to control all people’s lives, Meg realizes that she doesn’t want to be like everyone else because she is happy just being Meg.

The end of the book seems to say that conforming to the system is bad no matter what form it is in. ITs brain washing control over everyone represented this conformity. In the very beginning of the book it was also shown when Meg’s teachers forced her to relearn math she could already do, but instead of using a short cut they forced her to do it the long way around. What Ms. Whatsit briefly mentions, but is never fully explained is that not all conformity is bad. Meg never seems to understand that. Her teachers probably had a reason for forcing her to do it the long way around.  Through her stubbornness she ends up getting in her own way. We need to follow laws and do our work. We can do that though without changing who we are. Mrs. Whatsit explains this concept very well. She compares life to a sonnet. For a sonnet to be a sonnet it must follow a strict form and rhythm. However within that form the poet can write what ever he or she wants. In the words of Mrs. Whatsit “‘You are given the form but you have to write the sonnet yourself, what you say is completely up to you.’“

 Even though this book was written 40 years ago, it still applies to today. The pulsing rhythm of IT is sort of like a group mentality, trying to make you listen to the same music wear the same clothes and go to the same movies. Everyone wants to give in to this at some point or another. But you can never allow yourself to be lost in the group. You can never loose yourself. Charles Wallace fell into IT and it took the one thing that IT didn’t have to save him, love. Meg was able to provide IT with the one thing it could never give Charles Wallace, a real emotion.

 We can dress the way others do and speak the way others do, but we can never sacrifice our minds. We can never let others control our opinions, thoughts or feelings. Those are the things that make us who we are. By taking away that, we would take away our identities. 

The Archetype of the Shadow

            In Charlotte’s Web, the shadow isn’t as much of a person as an idea. It is the idea of the end. The ends of relationships and the ends of lives are all crucial parts of the plot. In most books the shadow, in any form, is strongly opposed by most of the character that you are rooting for. While this does apply to Wilber, it does not apply to Charlotte. Charlotte does everything in her power to save Wilber, but when it comes time for her to die, she accepts it, understanding that all things must end. This confused me because even though Wilber wasn’t killed, the shadow still won. Charlotte died and her relationship with Wilber ended.

            Charlotte’s Web is a children’s book. It is supposed to end “happily ever after”. Charlotte’s death was anything but happy. Still, the book does end on a note of happiness. It ends with a beginning. The archetype of the shadow in Charlotte’s Web is the idea of ending. The happiest parts of the book are the beginnings: the births, the life and the new relationships. The problem is that you can’t have one with out the other. Wilber never would have met Charlotte if his time with Fern hadn’t ended.  There is no beginning without an end, and there is no life without death. Charlotte understands this, and while she wishes she could see her daughters hatch, she knows that it is her time to go.

            Having the shadow actually be good is trying to say something. It is saying that we cannot waste our lives trying to stop the end from coming. We must accept endings and know that they lead to beginnings. 

Templeton

Charlotte’s Web, page 46 “Templeton is actually a bad rat”; page 58 “Is Templeton smiling at Wilber fondly, or laughing at him”; page 74 “Maybe he is gloating about this because he wants the other barn animals to like him more”; page 90 “Maybe Templeton is just being mean because he feels left out”; page 98 “I’m not sure weather Templeton is being mean or simply doesn’t get it”; page 159 “See, Templeton can be helpful!”; 167-168 “If all of the animals hadn’t just assumed Templeton didn’t have a kind bone in his body, maybe he would have been nicer to them and more willing to help”. 

When most people read Charlotte’s Web they think of Templeton as a character that changes over the course of the book. That is one way to look at it. I think it is also possible that our perception of Templeton changes. From the beginning of the book Templeton is pegged by the farm animals as an awful, mean, selfish rat. No one wants to even give him a chance. He is first described as having “no friendliness”,  “no conscience” and “no morals”. He doesn’t care about Wilber’s life, Charlotte’s life or anyone else’s in the book. He does however do some things that are instrumental in saving Wilber’s life. Even so, the only time Templeton is offered any kindness throughout the whole book is when Wilber leaves an extra half noodle in his trough for Templeton. This gets to Templeton. He believes he deserves some sort of thank you. When Wilber asks him to get Charlotte’s egg sack, he refuses. He mocks Wilber and reminds him of all the things he did to help him. Finally they strike a deal and Templeton gets the egg sack.

When I first read about Templeton I thought he was mean, annoying and a glutton.  His character fascinated me though because he seemed evil. While the rest of the characters were multidimensional, Templeton was so simple. I kept thinking about the way he was treated by the other animals. I realized that they treated him with indifference and contempt. Even though Templeton was always a glutton and slightly sarcastic, I realized that maybe Templeton hadn’t always been mean. He does do some nice things for Wilber and Charlotte after all. It also seems as though he wants the other animals in the barn to like him even though he tries not to show it. His desire to be liked appears when he tries to brag about saving Charlotte’s life. He wouldn’t brag if he didn’t care what the others in the barn thought. I think it is very possible that when Templeton arrived in the barn, the animals judged him. They assumed that just because he seemed unpleasant on the outside, he wouldn’t be a nice rat. Maybe, Templeton acts like he doesn’t care about the lives of Wilber and Charlotte because he thinks that they will treat him the way the rest of the animals do. Templeton was misrepresented when he was first described in the book. He was described the way the opinionated animals saw him. If he had been described the way he really was we might have formed different opinions about Templeton.

E. B. White is trying to send us a message about life. We can’t take things at face value. They are not always as they appear. People need to really examine what is going on around them and look at different aspects of a situation or a person. If we make a judgment before we know the full story then we haven’t really made a fair judgment. 

Why is Charlotte is sacrificing her own sleep so she can tell a whining pig a story?

Charlotte’s Web, page 102 “So Charlotte, although she, too, was tired, did what Wilber wanted.”

Charlotte has just spent hours working with the exasperatingly unmotivated rat, Templeton. They wake Wilber up just for a minute to find out if he can be “radiant”, so they can put it in the web. When it is time to go back to sleep Wilber can’t, so he asks Charlotte to tell him a story. Even though she is incredibly tired, she submits and ends up telling him two stories and singing him a song.

At first it made absolutely no sense to me why Charlotte wouldn’t simply tell Wilber to go to sleep. After all she has been doing all of this work to help him and he hasn’t once thanked her for it. If I were in her position I would have been pretty upset.  All Wilber seems to care about is his own life. He doesn’t realize that Charlotte is going to die even sooner then he is. I couldn’t understand why Charlotte would spend her whole life trying to save someone else’s.

            I kept thinking about Wilber and Charlotte’s relationship. Then I realized that maybe Charlotte wanted to spend her whole life saving Wilber’s. She knows exactly what she is doing, and she knows she is going to die soon. Maybe, this is her way of doing something important in her life. After all, she could just let Wilber die and spend her whole life in a barn catching flies and mosquitoes, but instead she has chosen to save Wilber and make a small difference in the world. Charlotte knows that her life is short and that she has to make what differences she can. This isn’t just true for Charlotte, but for all farm animals. They know that their life is short and they have to make the best of it.

            E.B. White was trying to say something about life and people. He was saying that we can’t just sit around on our butts and live our lives the way we are expected to. We can have to stand up and go out of our way to make a difference in the world.