Characters
1) The character I enjoyed the most was the main character Tobias Eaton. Tobias is the son of Marcus and Evelyn Eaton. His father Marcus was said to have noticed Tobias’s divergence at a young age so he stayed strict on him.His mother Evelyn died at a young age and so he was left with his abusive father Marcus. Although during his well prepped aptitude test he got an abnegation result he instead chose Dauntless as his faction at the Choosing Ceremony in order to escape his father. I enjoyed Tobias the most because he is quite a smart and skillful character and also helps Beatris Prior, the co-main character in several ways such as helping save her life when she was discovered to be divergent. Tobias was a very brave and smart character and this was displayed in the novel when he was helping save Tris. Tris was an outstanding recruit, impressively completing all initiations at very rare pace. “You got out three times faster than any of the other initiates. Whatever you are, you’re not a failure. You might be Divergent. I think.” (Roth, 204) After the tests, Tobias quickly picks up on Tris’s talent and realises that she is divergent. He then helps Tris in training to think like a regular dauntless to prepare for the final test so the other members …show more content…
don’t find out and kill her.
Tobias does this by using his bravery and intelligence. he snuck Tris into the test room and ran over several practice runs of the test showing her the exact moves to make and ways to think in order to deceive the other members in thinking she is a regular Dauntless
faction member and succeeds in doing so as Tris passes in flying colours on her test day.
2) The character I enjoyed the least was Eric. I did not enjoy Eric because he was very evil and sadistic. Eric was born in Erudite but transferred over to Dauntless and became Tobias’s rival as they both were in the same year of initiation. Tobias was ranked first and Eric second. Eric’s evilness can first be seen when he kills Amar who was their instructor as well as a divergent. Eric always enjoyed watching people in pain. Specifically when Tris was being beat in a fight by a fellow member and Tobias had walked away. “Tris getting beaten up "wasn't something I wanted to watch" (Roth 89) Tobias couldn’t take seeing Tris being hurt while Eric stood there and was fixated on it. “He stares with greedy eyes at Beatrice's fallen body, like the sight is a meal and he hasn't eaten in weeks.” (Roth 87) Describes Tobias. Eric’s sadistic side was in play nearly the whole book and is very bold through the contrast between Tobias’s character and how he is caring.
3) The thing that surprised me most by the characters was when Tobias finds his mom Evelyn Eaton alive who he had thought died a long time ago. Evelyn was born into the Erudite and then chose to transfer to abnegation. She then met Marcus Eaton, married him and conceived Tobias. Marcus was very abusive towards both Evelyn and Tobias which led to her having an affair and leaving them after Marcus attempted to try and expel her from Abnegation. At this point she faked her death thinking that it would make her son safer. Now a year after Tobias transferred to Dauntless she sent him a secret message. “On the day you hated most At the time when she died In the place where you first jumped on.” (Roth, 177) Tobias sits in despair reading it trying to make sense of this letter he received and soon pieces it together. It was his mother Evelyn who left this for Marcus in his apartment telling him to meet her at the train yard in which he first made his jump in the initiation of Dauntless as well as on the same day she had supposedly died on. This incident was very surprising to me as well because I had also believed his mother was dead and there was never any foreshadow that she might have been alive.
4) There are many characters in this novel I wouldn’t mind carrying qualities of. Specifically I would love to take on the the qualities of the main character Tobias. Tobias has elite combat skills as well as he is very well composed and able to perform under pressure. Being able to have Tobias’s combat skills would be very useful for me in defending myself as well as the ones I care about. If I am able to have an elite skill in combat I can make sure the people I care about are safe which really means alot. I love my family and friends and I already would do anything I can to protect them but with the skill I will have better success in making sure they stay safe. I would also love to take Tobias’s ability of staying calm and composed in pressured situations as seen in the novel when he was ordered to throw knives at Tris and try and make her flinch which he did very accurately and made sure no harm was done to her. This would be very useful for me since I play basketball and volleyball. Im am commonly put into pressured situations, with the game on the line I have to be able to stay composed focused and I must be able to perform efficiently. I feel this will help me in progressing to be the best player I can be!
5) All the characters in this novel were very believable. All characters had normal human characteristics which of course reflected of their faction. There were five factions; Abnegation who were known to be selfless and caring of others, Erudite who are intelligent and known to be vain, Dauntless who are the brave and considered the soldiers of the factions, Amity who are the peaceful and value peace and harmony above all else, and last but not least the Candor who are the honest and value honesty above all else. “The Candor are talking loudly, as always. The Amity are laughing, smiling, pulling food from their pockets and passing it around. The dauntless are raucous and loud, slung over the tables and chairs, leaning on one another and poking one another and teasing” (Roth, 6) Here Tobias describes how members of some of the factions are acting as he walks into his cafeteria and sees them. Besides the characteristics of their factions, here it becomes evident that they are all acting like regular human beings in their own ways. I can relate to this when I walk into my school's cafeteria and instantly you can see the different groups of people with their personalities being reflected in how they're acting at that exact moment together. The only part about the story that wasn’t very believable was the setting, the story takes place post apocalyptic time which I don’t see as being realistic.
Reflection on the Theme
1) The message I took from reading this text was that you have to be careful with the decisions you make as a teen. It is important because these decisions shape your life. In the novel, children are raised in their parents factions and once they turn 16, they get the option to choose for themselves which faction they wish to be apart of. This decision is permanent and will affect them for the rest of their lives. I feel this message is very important because it is very similar to our lives in reality. As we grow up we are disciplined and taught by our parents, once we are teens we begin to experience freedoms which lead us to make decisions, possibly life changing decisions. The decisions can come from choosing your post secondary education ranging to decisions made while out with friends such as doing drugs, unprotected sex, etc. These decisions have permanent effect on our lives so we must make these decisions with carefulness and good thought. One poor decision and your life, at such a young age can be altered for the worst if not lost.
2) The passage I considered to be most important in the novel was “Becoming fearless isn't the point. That's impossible. It's learning how to control your fear, and how to be free from it.” (Roth, 239). Here Tobias explains his theory on bravery and fear. This passage is important because it reflects on nearly everything in the book. The novel is about finding yourself, from childhood and growing up, you develop many fears. Once you turn 16 and have to choose your faction and you become scared of what's to come since you must choose a fate that will determine your life. You can’t let your fear define you. Tobias displays this mentality when choosing to leave Abnegation and his abusive father even though we was very afraid of him. Tobias overcame his fear of his father for that moment and was able to escape by joining dauntless making a better life for himself. This passage was also important because it helped shape the message of the novel in making sure you make careful decisions. You must overcome your fears, and make responsible decisions that are positive and that will help you as well as the ones you care about in life.
3) What affected my interpretation of the theme of fear the most, was a combination between the plot, and the characters. The plot had a big impact on my interpretation because through every event there was some fear in play. As Tobias began telling his story, the first thing he speaks about is getting away from his father whom he is scared of since he abuses him. Then when it comes time for his choosing ceremony he chooses the dauntless faction leaving behind his cruel father in abnegation. “I don’t dare to look back to see my father's face.” (Roth 32) This is Tobias’s reaction once he cemented his fate with dauntless. Even though he knows he has escaped from his father, he is still scared to even look at him. From there on Tobias begins his initiation with the the new faction. With each initiation Tobias was encountered with some type of fear. For example with his first initiation stunt he had to jump from a moving train onto a rooftop and then from that rooftop jumping down into a net. This wasn’t in his best interest since he had a fear of heights. The characters in this play also had a big impact in my interpretation of the theme. All characters in this novel had a set of fears. Everybody was afraid of something, these fears were discovered through the aptitude test. Tris had 7 fears; being trapped in a glass box, slowly drowning, being attacked by crows, being stuck on a slippery rock, killing her family, being intimate as well as peter setting her on fire. Tobias only had four fears which was very rare, because of that he was given the infamous nickname ‘Four”. His fears were heights, small spaces, shooting an innocent woman, and his last fear was his father. Fear lingered all throughout novel and most evidently in through the characters and plot of the novel which helped me in my interpretation of the theme.
4) If I was to draw the theme of fear for this novel symbolically, I would draw a glass box with one side shattered. I would draw this because I believe it accurately and powerfully displays my interpretation of the novel's theme. The box would represent something holding you back, a type of containment. In the novel this would represented by the way you are influenced in choosing your faction by your parents and then further by having to be categorized into one of the five factions. In specific this would relate to Tobias being stuck with his father and having to deal with all the pain he inflicted on him. The broken glass part would represent being free of containment. In the novel this is represented by finally having the chance to decide your fate in which faction you choose. The broken glass also represents being something different besides the normal. In specific this would be reflected by the Divergent characters in the novel who are unlike everyone else and don’t necessarily belong to any faction in particular but rather all of them.