A Child Called It By Dave Pelzer Thesis

The traumatic effect of the abuse marked Pelzer’s life. Through a psychological point of view, it is visible that there are many different ways the abuse affected Dave. Dave was mistreated in ways that made him wonder why. I was also left feeling perplexed and sometimes feeling frustrated, I wanted to know why David 's mother singled him out for her abuse and why his father, siblings, teachers, nurses, administrators, and neighbors did so little to protect him. Then, I realized that these were the same frustrations David has lived with most of his life.

Everything David did that was courageous. Most importantly, he survived the Nazi’s horrible control, showing his mother had influenced him. Even though David had a difficult childhood, David’s mother helped him a great

     The conflict of the story was Dave’s mother. She was cruel and unloving. She would drink and abuse Dave. For some reasons she never beat any of her other kids. Every time he stood up to her she would tell him he was a nobody or an “it”. She did cruel things for no reason. For example one time she tried putting him on the stove to burn him. Other times she would make a gas out of ammonia and Clorox in the bathroom and lock him in there for hours. The climax of the story is when people at school start noticing cuts and bruises on David. When a social worker is sent to his house, his mother starts treating him with love and pretends she’s sorry. Dave believes it and doesn’t say anything when the social worker comes. Dave thinks his dreams have come true and is very happy not knowing when the social

At the age of 5 years old, not only did he began to take showers with his father, but when they went to the beach club, his mother bathed him in the shower in the presence of other naked women. By the age of 6 years old, David noticed the power men had over women, “when a male entered the women’s side of the bathhouse, all the women shrieked”. (Gale Biography). At the age of 7 and 8 years old, he experienced a series of head accidents. First, he was hit by a car and suffered head injuries. A few months later he ran into a wall and again suffered head injuries. Then he was hit in the head with a pipe and received a four inch gash in the forehead. Believing his natural mother died while giving birth to him was the source of intense guilt, and anger inside David. His size and appearance did not help matters. He was larger than most kids his age and not particularly attractive, which he was teased by his classmates. His parents were not social people, and David followed in that path, developing a reputation for being a loner. At the age of 14 years old David became very depressed after his adoptive mother Pearl, died from breast cancer. He viewed his mother’s death as a monster plot designed to destroy him. (Gale Biography). He began to fail in school and began an infatuation with petty larceny and pyromania. He sets fires,

Due to his former boxing and martial arts background Dave thought teaching the teenagers how to defend themselves safely and the meaning of discipline was an important and relevant skill. He would teach fitness and the word of God in way that the people could understand. He connected life lessons to Gods teachings and helped guide his students in the right direction in the Gods name. Dave really felt that he could help these troubled youth, as he once was on the wrong path of life and can understand what they are feeling and going through. The teenagers he worked with felt that he was a good councillor through situations and always knew they could rely on him for help. Father says in one of his interviews that the start of this event was the beginning of a new movement to guide troubled youth and to teach the word of

A Child Called It, is an astonishingly horrific true story of “one child’s courage to survive”. Once said “Such a story cannot fail to move.” this is exactly how I felt about this book. Dave Pelzer the author and protagonist of A Child Called It tells the story of his life as one of the worst seen cases of child abuse in the state of California. Dave’s mental strength and resilience is what truly drives the theme of the story and the physical and mental abuse that he had to endure.

The Child Called It by Dave Pelzer is heart wrenching but very true nonfiction novel. Dave records all of the previous events that have occurred throughout his childhood. How does Dave use imagery and symbolism throughout the autobiography? Pelzer incorporates multiple aspects of both imagery and symbolism several times throughout the piece.

The beginning of the book talks about what it was like before things went horrifyingly wrong. The family took vacations together, his mother was a loving mother and wife, and Dave's father was his hero. This eventually changed, as did everything in Dave's life. His father never turned out to be his hero, but a drunken firefighter who left him, and at times he wished his mother dead. When the torture and abuse began it was minimal, Dave describes it in the book as punishment instead of discipline but as the book progressed so does the intensity. As the story progresses Dave's feelings are expresses, he speaks of his mother, as either "The Bitch" or just "Mother" there is absolutely no love in the way he speaks of her at all. His anger is also expressed and shown in way he talks about his, once beloved hero, his father and his brothers.

Dave was use to being loved and nurtured until later that year. In the climax the theme is expressed from Dave being stabbed by his mother. It was the summer of 1971 Dave explains to us: “ Out of the corner of my eye I saw a blurred object fly from her hand. A sharp pain erupted from just above my stomach.” (Pelzer 87)

The Lost Boy was written by David Pelzer. David pelzer was born in California and was abused by his Mother in childhood, he is currently 55 years old. The genre of this book is an autobiography because it is written by David Pelzer himself. The age group of this book is anywhere from about 13-18 the years of your life where you begin to mature. Dave is rescued from his mother. He makes a

his father and dead mother. David's father has an idealized vision of his son as

Dave Pelzer’s life started out as many children’s lives do. He was surrounded by a mother and father who loved him and would do anything for him. He recalls himself as well as his two brothers being blessed with perfect parents who filled the family with love and care (Pelzer, 1995). His father, Stephen, supported the family and worked as a fireman in San Francisco, while his mother, Catherine, was a woman who glowed with love for her children and family (Pelzer, 1995). In the summer, the family would go on a vacation often times to Portola or Memorial Park, where they would camp in a large tent for a week. One time, they even went to Johnson’s Beach, where the adventures were endless. In this time, Dave learned how to swim on his back and his mother was so proud of him for it. Every day was sprinkled with magic, especially as Dave’s mother came and gave him a hug from behind. In this time, he had never felt as safe and as warm as he had at that moment, not knowing that things were soon to change in the most drastic way (Pelzer, 1995). Catherine went from a loving mother to a nightmare while Stephen went from a protective father, to a coward. Dave became the subject of child abuse, which had an impact on his childhood development explained by three well known theorists, Bronfenbrenner, Piaget, and Kohlberg.

David was punished in horrific and appalling ways. He was punished from a young aged boy to then growing into a teenaged boy. David was disciplined from his father through ways such as, physical, violent and mental abuse which reflected on David’s illness, resulting in mental breakdowns. I wanted to place the audience in David’s shoes, and engage them into his life. My goal was to attract the audience towards David’s 3 stages of life throughout the film.

So, he got up off his side and went into the town to get help so he could find his family and get back to the water. As he walked through town, he learned a lot. He learned that people were scared of him and that he was scared of humans. He learned that the road gets REALLY hot when it’s 90 degrees outside. Also, he learned how it’s really hard to get around when your 11 feet long and can’t fit in places like the coffee shop or the alley ways. As he roamed the streets like a tourist from another country, he found Dave’s parents!

One reason why this book has changed my life is because it motivated me to keep pushing through difficult times. Pelzer persevered under the circumstances he was condemned to. Both Dave and I dealt with rocky relations