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Analysis Of The Boys In The Brown By Daniel James Brown

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Gauri Patel AP Language- Mrs. Davis September 6, 2017 Chapters 1-6 of The Boys in the Boat: Mirrors or Windows? As I read pages 31-37, the edge of a different perspective on life is evident. The author, Daniel James Brown gives the reader a prestigious and detailed window view of every possible adversity in Joe Rantz’s life. The young, hopeless, Joe was the second child of Nellie Maxwell and Harry Rantz and a younger brother to Fred Rantz. Growing up with one catastrophe after another, the reader begins to realize that his weakness and instability was driven out of his traumatic familial relationships. The traumatic experiences Joe faced as a child, described earlier in the chapter, shows why he is such an independent character. Spring of …show more content…

Between the 1929 and 1939, The Great Depression struck the lives of many families, “living under cardboard, poverty, homelessness, jobless” and much more. However, Joe’s early childhood was just more than that. His early experiences set him to learn many lessons for a life time. There was very minimal support from who he called his family, a his cowardly father, sick mother, his devastated brother, and now his heartless stepmother. Just as things seemed to be settling and normal for the disadvantaged young man, things began to fall apart again as a never ending tragedy to him. At their new home, Thula grew frustrated with anxiety about her limited practice to become a future violinist as well as her barbaric character in raising her stepson whom she didn’t have an ounce of respect, sympathy, or care for. The hardworking and self-determined Joe grew up to always being interested in learning and actively working. He had a passion for gardening which the family used in need of their hunger and use of scarce food. As tension boiled over summery days and nights, Thula grew harsher and harsher towards Joe to a point where she informed Harry about his habits and threatened to leave him if he hadn’t let Joe go. Harry, being the coward and forlorn father he was, chose to arrange Joe with a schoolteacher and schoolhouse to make Thula’s life at home easier. From the passages in Chapter 2, the reader is able to understand how depressing, miserable, and hard Joe’s childhood was. It

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