Shattered By Eric Walters: Character Analysis

Alexandra Schleicher
Mr. Farsad
Grade 9 English
May 23, 2014
Evolution of Ian 's character throughout the book Shattered by Eric Walters.
`Ian from the book ‘Shattered’ by Eric Walters is a fifteen-year-old student passionate about friends, his social life, wealthy lifestyle and the hope of getting a car for his sixteenth birthday. He is selfish, lazy and lacks interest in school, especially his social studies class. He is reluctant to complete his mandatory community service hours that he needs to pass his social studies course. He has no personal gain by completing the hours and his only motivation is that his father is rewarding him with a car if he passes all his courses. As he attempts to find the easy way out he choose to work at
‘The Club’, he later discovers it is a soup kitchen on the homeless end of town. Ian’s personality gradually ameliorates over time as he is exposed to different views of society. As Ian becomes a more mature individual and begins to step up and make a difference in society. Ian’s passion and selflessness helped him overcome the stereotypes society had taught him to cover up the truth that clouded his judgement, allowing him to mature and build a stronger character not influenced by society.
Throughout this book Ian’s passion grew to go farther than for his own personal gain and extended to become passionate about others.
This is reflected when Ian talks to his social studies class and makes them aware about the homeless community and the horrible events in other countries. At the beginning of the book Ian was unable to see past the small community he lived in, he was oblivious to the tragic events that went on all over the world. He simply did not care what was happening because it did not affect him. If his life did not directly change because of some other tragedy than he could not be bothered to acknowledge it. In the same way he also is very shielded from the world outside his community. This is inferenced in the following quote “…did they even have TV? They had to. No country was so backwards that they didn’t get MTV?” (Walters p.103). This quote represents that Ian is very ignorant about the state of third world countries and he is unaware about how lucky he is to lead the life he does. Very soon after this quote Ian began to realize that the world is not as perfect as he once thought it was, not in Canada nor in other countries. He researches the genocide in Rwanda that one of the homeless men from the kitchen was part of and it consumed a large part of his time. He began thinking about the event and also trying to find out as much as he can about the people that went through it. Ian 's character evolved to become more passionate for the things that
affect the world and not only himself. He decides to share his findings with his social studies class. He is astonished that the majority of his class seems remarkably clueless to the genocide in Rwanda. He becomes very frustrated that his generation has become so ignorant. As the class discusses the genocide Ian said “…But a million people, we don’t know them so we don’t care about what happened to them. A million is just a number a statistic” (Walters p.135). This quote is the reflection of Ian 's newfound passion for the world around him. He now sees beyond the Iron Gate community and into the world of those people in his own country and all over the world. His passion seeps into his want to be able to feel for those faceless people part of the statistic and he wants to share these tragedies with the world.
Ian’s character was able to develop in more ways than one, making him a well-rounded individual.
Although his passion towards world issues had developed greatly, Ian also became selfless and less reliant on material objects. This becomes apparent when he helps Jacques, a former military peacekeeper come forward with his drinking problem and what caused it. He then takes initiative and finds an addiction program to help him get clean. Formerly Ian only cared for material objects and trying to do the bare minimum work so he gets what he wants. Ian did not care for others and did not care how his actions affected other people. This is presented in the following quote “…Now, thinking about the car, the job interview had some real meaning” (Walters p.2). This quote was meant to tell the audience how selfish Ian was in the beginning of the book. It displays his unwillingness to do anything that does not directly benefit himself. Despite his selfishness he was able to realize that it was important to help people you care about even if you get nothing in return. Shortly after, Ian begins to care less about what he gets in return for his actions, and more about how we can help other people. This becomes apparent when he realizes his homeless friend Jacques is trying to block out his past as a military peacekeeper by drinking. In the first scene of the book Ian met Jacques on the streets and Jacques saved him from three thugs. Jacques actions were selfless and this influences Ian.
This was the key moment in the book when Ian’s character began to evolve. From that moment on Ian slowly began to think about others feelings and how his actions affect everyone else. Once Ian found out about Jacques drinking problem he felt compelled to help him. This can be viewed in these two particular quotes, “It’s just that I think you should stop drinking” (Walters p.181) and “I can’t do that. I won’t do that. Mac told me about places that can help you stop drinking.” (Walters p.181). In these two quotes you can tell Ian’s display of selflessness has come a long way throughout the book. There was no benefit on Ian 's behalf to help Jacques with his drinking problem, especially since he was so reluctant. Even so Ian continued to push the idea because he truly cared about Jacques’ well being. This shows great development of Ian 's character throughout this book.
In conclusion, Ian’s experience at the soup kitchen really opened up his mind to the world around him and he was able to be more considerate of people other then himself. His experience exposed him to a verity of people that he had never encountered and helped disprove the stereotypes he grew up believing. He was able to become less ignorant and open his eyes to the world and its imperfections and see past the blindfold society puts on people. Eric Walters was trying to inference this throughout the book, like Ian students and teenagers should be more open and aware to world issues as well as not let stereotypes distort your judgement of character. Ian was able to become a more passionate individual that was able to raise awareness on the Rwanda genocide in his social studies classroom as well as become more exposed to world issues. Furthermore Ian took initiative and was able to overcome his reliance on material object and is now more caring towards others as he becomes selfless, he began to help people regardless of how he benefited or was affected. Therefore, in summary, by researching the Rwanda genocide and sharing his findings with his class as well as helping Jacques confront his drinking problem and getting him into a drinking program, Ian 's character was able to evolve over the course of the novel to become more passionate and selfless.

Works Cited:
Walters, Eric. Shattered:With A Foreward By Lieutenant General Romeo Dallaire. N.p.: n.p., 2006. Print.