Roland Barthes, French philosopher and linguist once said, “Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.” In saying this, Barthes familiarizes the reader with the idea that everyone copes with the negative aspects in their lives, big or small, in many different ways. He compacted an invaluable message into a single sentence. Chris Crutcher, author, family therapist, and ardent advocate against the censorship of literature, does the same thing in his 2007 novel, Deadline. Deadline is about 18 year old Ben Wolf, who goes to the doctor’s office for a sports physical and leaves with a diagnosis of a rare, fatal blood disorder and a year to live. Ben decides to keep his diagnosis a secret, and as the novel progresses, he has to deal with the consequences …show more content…
In the onset of the book, when Ben is first told that he has a blood disorder, he has to find a way to immediately cope with the news. His primary reaction is to escape from the situation, to get a “breather,” so to speak, and he requests said escape through a witty remark, as he often will throughout the novel: “‘You got no sharp instruments in here, Doc, and nothing to make a noose. Go’” (Crutcher 4). Trusting that Ben won’t do anything he would regret, Doctor Wagner did as Ben asked and left the room. Once alone, Ben considers what his options were regarding telling his loved ones, in specific, his family. Of this Ben discloses that, “...bringing [his family] Doc’s news would break the fragile symmetry of [their] lives” (Crutcher 6). Upon realizing this, Ben leaves the hospital and goes for a run. Running, as well as football, become a coping mechanism for Ben throughout the novel. However, in the end of the novel, the reader can notice a drastic change in Ben’s overall character, especially in his last few days. Ben is suddenly willing to accept his death, which he was unable to do before, even when the effects of his disease were beginning to become more evident in his daily life. Ben begins, as he describes, “...living in a gauzy haze…”(Crutcher 304). He goes on to explain that he is continuing to become weaker and weaker, but he manages to keep his core …show more content…
This change in Ben’s character supports the theme because Ben is finally able to both face and cope with the loss of his life using healthy methods. These methods contrast greatly with how he dealt with his loss in the beginning of the novel. In relation to Ben’s coping methods, his eventual girlfriend, Dallas Suzuki's technique of dealing with loss. For instance , after Ben and Dallas return from the homecoming
After Chase dominates Ben in the scrimmage that Chase treated as a championship game, pointing at the crowd and smiling at his parents every time he made a shot, Ben starts to get down on himself. At this time, Ben was depressed and was always thinking about Chase and he feels like he is all he thinks about. After a long talk with his best friend Lily, he decides he needs to practice. So he starts weekly staying
Despite Ben’s promise that he will never use the Call again after he has left Greg, he makes a call to warn away a horse and rider. The horse panics and slips, breaking its leg, and Ben is guiltily forced to kill it before fleeing from
Begins with a comforting scene of Ben with his parents. The dreamy filter the scene is given makes it seem like a dream and/or a flashback. Initially, Ben was excited to have a sister and pleased as he says to his Mum, "I can't wait for the baby to come then we're gonna be best friends, aren't we?" However this is quickly changed when Ben drifts in and out of sleep, his first view being of his Mum singing to him and the third one of his Mother’s hair turning white and the desperation he
Ben saying, “I want to keep it that way,” is him saying that if he told his dad, then his dad would lose his cool. Right in the beginning, Ben keeps his disease to himself to protect others, but in the end, he just hurts them. Later in the book, Ben comes to this conclusion. “I wish I'd said it right away. I wish I hadn't been so selfish as to think I could ask for a normal year.”
After confiding in him, she says, “I hate secrets”. They’ll kill you if they kill you. They’re worse than my uncle” (Crutcher 186). This makes Ben feel guilty for not telling Dallas that he was dying. However, it’s a lose-lose scenario.
He initially had no interest at all in nature, but after some adjustments he changed his mind and gained a “relationship” with nature and, he even learned some survival skills along the way. In the beginning of the text, Ben preferred to be indoors making videos, or being a detective or even just watching television rather than being outside like his younger sister Olive. This meant that unlike his sister Ben did not develop any survival skills. This became a problem, when the Silver family were suddenly on the run from the cops and found themselves in a life or death situation. The novel mentions that, ‘wilderness was his enemy”. This was one way of showing that Ben did not like to be outside in nature. Eventually, Ben changes views and he now appreciates and enjoys being outdoors in nature. He even finds peace within the wilderness. The novels says Ben had “missed this placed”. This shows that he has changed tremendously. He has gone from Ben, the being indoors lover, to Ben the Nature loving boy. This was a significant change for the
Ben’s Purpose in the Drama (Consider how his appearances give meaning to the drama as a foil* to Willy.)
Reilly uses similes when describing Ben’s injuries during his race, with concrete facts and evidence, resulting with the reader feeling sympathetic for Ben. We can see this at various points throughout the piece, like when his coach says, “I don't think there's an inch of that kid I haven't had to bandage up." We can see it again when his own mother can’t even watch her son run sometimes because his falls are so bad. Reilly uses pathos to really highlight the terrible hardships that Ben has to go through, and to force the reader to feel what it’s like to be in his shoes. This puts the reader in the situation that Ben is in; given the circumstances, would you give up? Now most people would throw in the towel, but that’s the thing. Ben Comen is not most people. This really accents the message because he’s not letting his disability get the better of him. This also accents the passionate tone because Reilly pieces the article together so well that you can tell how passionate Ben is about anything and everything he does in his
Ben did not have a very good relationship with his dad. They did not talk with each other like a father and son should. ‘He really wanted out of here, out of this room, away from this person is by accident of birth his son’. He once fell in love with a girl named Nettie Halversham. She did not love him back though.
In like manner, Romero’s stereotypical portrayal of the protagonist Ben was that of an alpha male. Ben differs in nature and demeanor to Barbra. Ben embodied the alpha male, an aggressive, domineering unpleasantly rough hero who was persistent in finding solutions despite various objections. His aggression allowed him to courageously take on the ghouls, even if it involved him stepping outside to fend them off. When a multitude of the undead surrounded the farmhouse, Ben stepped outside and fought the ghouls and successfully slew a small number of the zombies while the other characters stayed inside the farmhouse. Ben also arrogantly asserted his plans above the other characters. A prime
After several months of taking care of Christine with her memory impairment, Ben could not take it anymore. Before Ben left Christine he wrote a letter to her just in case her memory improved and she had questions about his absence: “I think I knew then that one day I would have to leave you. I love you more than I love anything. But I have to give our son a life. A life he deserves.
Gradually, Ben overall becomes sensitive to the environment. The sadness has overwhelmed him and left him a primitive form. He becomes impaired in the way that he relies on a caretaker and is unable to recapture the memories of himself after he’s gone. Once Ben becomes missing, people don’t search for him but instead call to ask where he has been. After about a week everyone in his life ceases to call or look. Annie is the only one to evoke the memories of Ben, the disabled man who became primitive
This leads to his joining or conforming alongside the other zombies, or the military. Ben successfully avoids the zombie attack, showing he avoided becoming a soldier to fight the Vietnam
Now in the literary story Benjamin has a grandfather who at the start was antagonized, became to enjoy his grandson’s company. It is a brief account of his grandfather but a meaningful one as this was the first one who gave him a sense of acceptance. The film version gave him acceptance through Queenie and we never get to know a grandfather; though one could say the patrons at the old folk’s home could have been grandparent surrogates for Benjamin. The patrons at the old folks home taught him many things but his experience living there taught him not to fear death and what loss was about which, in a sense, desensitized the character so that when Queenie passes he is not visibly upset.
Ben is also a peculiar character in that he is not really a character. For one, he was completely a figment of Willy's imagination. He also does not appear inn the requiem (Smith). In a Paris Review Interview, Miller acknowledged