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Flashbacks In Chocolat

Decent Essays

The book Chocolat by Joanne Harris looks at the life of single mother chocolatier named Vianne and the struggles she endures at the hand of a small French village after she moves there during the beginning of Lent. Vianne quickly meets many different characters around the town from the straight-laced Father Reynaud to Josephine, a woman struggling in an abusive relationship. Each of the characters face their own struggles throughout the story and Joanne Harris has used different techniques to make the audience sympathise with the characters including point of view, symbolism and flashbacks. The book in written in first perspective and the point of view switches between the two characters Vianne and Reynaud as their Feud progresses. The use …show more content…

Vianne’s childhood and her bohemian mother has affected her greatly and created her fears of the black man and settling down. The flashbacks foreshadow and show her mother’s death and give a glimpse off the struggles she faced due to being a child of a single mother who travelled around. Seeing the struggles makes the audience sympathise with Vianne as they have seen what she has lived through and the lifestyle’s effect on her attitudes and behaviour. They also provide background for her dislike towards the church due to her experience with condescending church members. This parallels the response to Vianne raising Anouk alone that makes the reader further sympathetic as she is experiencing what her mother went through. “I envy the table’s calm sense of peace. It has been here a long time. It belongs.” This line shows her childhood’s impact on her. Due to the constant travelling and moving she feels as if she belongs nowhere and she desperately wants to but, “even as I slide into sleep I find myself considering the thought, not only with longing but with disbelief”, she doesn’t believe she can belong

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