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The Body: Journey from Innocence to Experience

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The Body: Journey from Innocence to Experience
The Body reflection paper
The main theme of The Body is the journey from innocence to experience. Fear of authority, childish behavior, childish humor, and the tree house tells the reader that they are just young immature boys. As the story continues there is a change in maturity level. They begin to smoke cigarettes and use foul language. Each one of the characters plays a role in their group.
The story is told from Gordie’s point of view. Gordie is the smart one in the group and the one that is going to be successful. He is a writer which is a similarity that Gordie shares with Stephen king. Denny, Gordie’s older brother died in a car accident and his parents haven’t been the same since. You could say that Denny was the favored child. So Gordie could get away with just about anything, “I’d been like the invisible boy that whole summer”. Chris is like Gordie’s older brother who is always pushing him to succeed. Not only was Chris a big brother to Gordie but to the whole group. Although Chris wants to be successful he does not think he will ever be able to get out of Caste Rock because of his family’s reputation. Teddy was the trouble boy in the group. His father was somewhat to blame because he would beat on teddy and after awhile he was sent to a mental hospital. Not only was Teddy the troubled boy but he was also the risk taker and a crazy boy that dreamed of being in the military just like his father. Vern is the last one of the boys and he was the sissy of the group. In order to get an understanding of each of the characters Stephen King uses the relationships between the boys to really display the character traits.
Rural Maine is where the story takes place. The film accurately portrays the setting with all of the trees and where the train tracks are high above the river which causes them to walk on the train tracks. Stephen King studied at the University of Maine which is how he adds just a little bit more of himself into the story. As the boys are

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