Johnny Tremain Character Traits

Personality is not shaped right away. It isn’t passed on from generation, nor is it congenital. We can picture this like moldable clay. You can spin it around and use your fingers to shape patterns or shapes, but once it dries, it is almost indelible. In Johnny Tremain, one of the main characters, Isannah Lapham, gets caught in a web of outer influences and wrong ideologies, ultimately affecting and shaping her personality as one who values the contemporary standards instead of family ethics. Beginning in the opening of the book, Johnny mentions Isannah’s tendency to use her beauty to bribe and capture one’s money and attention. “Cilla loved Isannah. She was proud when people stopped her on the street and said, ‘Is that little angel your sister?’ Isannah uses her theatrical
However, Isannah doesn’t give anything for her family in return for her elevated repute, but instead turns a cold shoulder towards those who dearly loved and took care of her. Slowly consumed by the power she gains from being with the Lyte’s, Isannah deserves those appellations after leaving her household behind. Miss Lavinia wanted Isannah to be like what she wanted to be if she was poor. An actress during that time was similar to prostitution, and Isannah strives to become one after being lascivious in front of His Majesty’s men. “ [Miss Lavinia] was laughing hilariously, as she attempted to fasten two flat surfaces of cardboard painted with two spots onto Isannah. But Isannah had nothing but her undershift, her little pink legs bare to the middle thigh.”(192) Although Isannah doesn’t realize this, Miss Lavinia’s influence begins the real transfixion of on her; yet, to Isannah, she doesn’t care whether she has but corrupted or not because she gets all her wishes