Essay about The Representation of Power in Cormier's The Chocolate War

What is power? Power means the strength and the right given of controlling anyone else. However, when too much power is given to someone, dictatorship cannot be avoided. In the book “Animal Farm”, George Orwell used a lot of events happened on the farm to illustrate that how did the ‘animalism’ turn into “totalitarianism” and well defined the sentence “Absolute power corrupts absolutely”, which also reflects how the society was like at that time. Therefore, in order to find out the reason why George Orwell wrote the story, this essay will talk about how power is abused and the effect on other "comrades" by using several events and the examples of language features used in the story.

The Chocolate War is a story which takes place in New England in the 1970's. Most of the events happen in a Catholic school. Since this school was exclusively for boys, they were constantly trying to prove their power over each other. The story is told in third person omniscient. The story's mood is suspenseful. With each page turn one wonders if Jerry will take or refuse his chocolates. The protagonist of this story is Jerry Renault and the antagonist in Archie Costello. Jerry is a very quiet fifteen year old boy. He is also the quarterback for the Trinity High junior varsity football team. He is a very troubled individual due to his mother's

Robert Cormier wanted the characters be different, he did not make them how others wanted, being socially acceptable, he wrote the book how he thought it should have went in his mind, and doing so he gave the readers some new to read not just the everyday novel. Cormier gives the reader many examples of figurative language to express the real meaning of the story for example, “Caroni watched the chalk in Brother Leon’s hands, the way the teacher pressed it, rolled it, his fingers like the legs of spiders with a victim in their clutch.” (90) In this quote Cormier gives a similar to exaggerate about how Brother Leon was holding the chalk in his hands. It sends a powerful message to the reader that Brother Leon is a horrible man, who had no mercy and he is seen by others as a powerful administrator in the school using quid-pro-quo in his own evil type of way. Cormier also uses more figurative language to give a specific emotion that Cormier was trying to express throughout his novel, that not every time someone disturbs the universe something good comes out of it. “What happened with Renault was bad enough, but there was violence in the air.”(209) This quote is the the example that even though Renault did disturb the universe and did try to stop the chocolate sale, he failed and something bad happened to him for trying. In the end Jerry's attempts to stop the chocolate sales failed, and still there was still violence in the air meaning the enemy he tried to defeat was angry, but still undefeated. And many readers dislike Cormiers way to end the book in a way that the hero does not defeat the villain(s). Like Richard Peck said ”The young will understand the outcome. They won’t like it but they’ll understand.” (10) And this is exactly what Cormier had in mind when he was writing the book, that the readers wouldn’t like the ending, but

The characters of the novel are fit to the theme of man’s intuitive evilness, as the boys are under the age of 14. When they continue to enjoy torturing others, they reveal their enjoyment of being savages. They do not desire any order or law of directing force in their state of savagery.

Initially, our first thoughts of Jerry at the beginning of the story, is that he acts immature and is burdened within a circle of maternal protection. During the opening of the story, the author conveys Jerry’s relative childishness by labeling him as “the boy”. The author also uses the mother to demonstrate his youth and how he is trapped in a circle of maternal protection which leads us to think that he is lonely due to that reason. In this part, “His mother walks in front of him, carrying a bright white strap in one hand” tells us that because the mother was walking in front of him, it gives us the impression that the mother still thinks of him as a boy that needs to be protected from any potential harm. We see more of Jerry’s immaturity and how the burden of protection leads his actions as we go through the story. During the part where Jerry sees the group of boys acting free-spirited, we see that he is overcome with desire to be with them, probably because he feels that because he is always in the circle of protection making him feel lonely and isolated from everyone. At first, he is added into the group and begins to have fun jumping from the cliff into the water with the other boys. Later on however, he starts to act immature when he realizes he could not do the same thing the other boys were doing. That was, underwater for a long time and going through the dark tunnel and he becomes scared. In this passage,“... In a panic of failure, he yelled up, in English, “Look at me! Look!” and he began splashing and kicking the water like a

This ideal has been a staple of American life since the Revolutionary War. In fact, American authors often write novels about Katnisses or Trises fighting and even superseding corrupt governments and tyrants (Collins; Roth). However, these stories are often exaggerated and romanticized, yielding an inspirational, yet overdone plotline. Realistic writer Robert Cormier challenges this common theme by writing The Chocolate War, a story in which the protagonist isn’t necessarily a “good guy” and likewise does not “win”. In his novel The Chocolate War, Robert Cormier uses the cruelty of some characters and the indifference of others to show that it takes many

The works I have studied and will be exploring in this essay are Mary Shelly’s ‘Frankenstein’ and Joseph Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’. In ‘Frankenstein’ the abuse of power is most clearly exhibited by the protagonist of the story Frankenstein himself, his abuse of power results in his isolation and could serve as a warning to people, telling them not to play with forces that they can not control. In ‘Heart of Darkness’, Conrad abuses his power as the author to distance himself from the novella and in a sense absolve himself from any racist criticism the book may induce. The abuse of power is also a key theme in the novella itself. Firstly there is a sense of hypocrisy in

Jerry Renault in The Chocolate War appears to be “going with the flow”—trying out for football, checking out girls—but his inner character drives him to differ. He fights to grasp his feelings and lacks self-confidence when he needs it most. As Jerry begins to unearth his inner-self, other obstacles and ideas dealing with certain emotions arise. As he progresses and reaches a level of comprehension, he grows closer to his goal—a sense of self-rule.

‘The Gothic world is fascinated by the struggle for power’. In light of this statement, discuss the ways in which writers present types of power.

The characterization of Jerry illustrates the stages of maturing and becoming independent. In the beginning of the story, Jerry is depicted as young and immature. The immaturity of Jerry is shown when he is trying to capture the older boys’ attention. In order to capture their attention, “he began splashing and kicking in the water like a foolish dog.” This action conveys that Jerry is still immature, and wants to join the older kids. After seeing the boys pass through the tunnel, Jerry also wants to pass through in order to be a part of their group. In order

Power as a corrupting force has been present from the beginning of time and is often revealed in many works of literature. In the novel Frankenstein by Marry Shelly and Macbeth by William Shakespeare, corruption of power is well brought forth in the characters in both texts. In both stories, characters reveal power as a corrupting force through their thirst of knowledge. Characters also reveal power as a corrupting force through character change. In addition, the character’s action justify how corrupted they really are. Therefore, power corrupts the individuals because of character’s extreme ambition which leads to

The story of ‘Animal Farm’ written by George Orwell, and the Film ‘V for vendetta’ produced by James McTeigue both explore the driving forces behind greed and power. In each of these stories there are many similarities of the concept of abusing power. Both stories also demonstrate that they don’t follow the key importance of communism, that is “communism only works if everyone is equal.

Brother Leon won’t let you get away with it. “ By the end of the book Goober went to the rally when he was sick and tried to see if he could help Jerry possibly before it had begun or after it was over because he knew that he had no control of the unfolding events at the present time. At the very end of the book, after Jerry got beat up by Emile Janza, Goober helped Jerry and told him, “ Everything will be alright…” That was my idea of “good”, hole-hearted, honest, loyal, polite, and most of all a person who helps people when they are in need of help. Goober displayed those traits within the choices and responsibilities that he had throughout the book. Those are the qualities that I found very appealing and admirable. I admire him to the fullest extent and I would probably do the same thing if I were in hiss position.

When discussing the twentieth century in Europe everyone can agree that this period was a brutal one for the continent. A common opinion, many have is that despite all of the turmoil experienced throughout this period, including two world wars, the success of democracy as a style of government was never truly in doubt. This paper will go against this widely held belief, and argue that democracy’s success in this period was not written in stone.

The most memorable and significant works are the ones that address problems within society, and this 1996 novel is a prime example of the postmodern era that has left its mark “nearly two decades” after its release(Choules). Although it is hard to attribute one definition to postmodernism, it can be seen as a concept that arose after World War II, characterized by portraying the “capitalistic values of the Western world.” (Philosophy) Turning to destruction and violence to cope with the feelings of inequality, which are still a part of society today, are cleverly included in the novel Fight Club. As the fight clubs grow the sudden commitment to this new ideology of blind allegiance to a leader in order to prove self worth takes control of the men. This new brotherhood and allegiance to one entity causes the men to lose all sense of self direction and to give all their attention to the needs and regulations of Fight