1. In the book The Chocolate War, the protagonist is Jerry Renault. The Vigils are a gang who bully other students at Trinity High School. In the beginning of the story he is given a challenge by The Vigils not to sell any boxes chocolate at the school's annual fundraising sale. This is shocking as Brother Leon, who is the chairperson of the sale, instructs The Vigils to assist with the sale. Jerry initially complies with The Vigils' challenge, and doesn't sell any chocolate.
As the story progresses, chocolate sales slow down. Some students have not made their goal of fifty boxes. Therefore, The Vigils comply with Brother Leon and order Jerry to start selling chocolate. This is when he shows a change in his attitude; he ignores the demand
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and refuses to sell chocolate. He doesn't want other students telling him what to do. As the sale comes to a close, Jerry has still refused to sell any boxes of chocolates.
To earn money for Jerry's quota of the sale, The Vigils arrange a fight between Jerry and another student. After the fight, Jerry is covered in blood and passed out. He learns it is sometimes in his favor to listen to others.
2. I can best relate to Obie, even though he is a minor character in the book. Like Obie, I am both nice and easy going. For example, according to Obie's thoughts in the book I also think Archie, Jerry's biggest rival, is not nice at all. Obie expresses sympathy towards Jerry's mother's recent passing. If I was in the book, I also would have done the same thing. I know how important support is from a friend when my grandfather died. Obie, is just the quiet kid who allows himself to be bossed around by other students.
I also hate what The Vigils do on a day to day basis. Obie is part of The Vigils, but does not show it through his attitude or actions. However, Obie is too nice and unable to confront The Vigils and tell them what he feels they are doing is wrong. If a friend, a group, or any person does something that I am not really in favor of, I usually tend to keep it to myself. And lastly, like Obie I usually let others tell me what to do. I'm not the type of person to give
orders. 3. I did not like the ending at all as it was a fight. I personally am not a fan of wrestling, fighting, or violence. It was somewhat unrealistic how the whole school arranged a fight without any of the staff knowing in advance. The author described in his biography that the novel was denied by several publishers, due to the violent ending. I can obviously understand why several publishers would not publish the novel. In spite of the violent ending, I did like the raffle that The Vigils arranged to sell Jerry's share of the chocolates. The book should have ended with The Vigils conducting a raffle at the end, without a fight of any sort. Students could have simply bought tickets and had an opportunity to win fifty boxes of chocolate. As far as Jerry goes, I would have had him learn a lesson without violence. I think it would have been great if he just realized he should have supported the school and not listened to The Vigils. If I were the author, I would even have concluded the book with Jerry proving his loyalty to Trinity by volunteering to keep track of the fundraising sale with Brother Leon next year.
The three connections between the Butter Battle Book to the Cold War are quite apparent. There is a wall separating different people, there is a different way of life, and there is a deterrent. The book by Theodor Guisel, also known as Dr. Suess, is almost a mirror image of the situation during the Cold War.
People are not prone to agree with one another. If you gather a dozen people together for a dinner party and the subject turns to politics or religion, then there is inevitably going to be an argument. There is one thing, however, that there is a near universal consensus on: chocolate is a wonderful and delicious thing.
Major conflicts can be exposed through literature. The cold war and the war in The Butter Battle Book have similar people and events that should not be exposed to children through literature.
... his groin but tries to defend himself. This is against the rules. After this a "free for all" begins. The lights are turned off by Brother Jacques, who is trying to stop all the madness. The story ends as Jerry is lying almost unconscious in his friend Goober's arms. Archie is taking pleasure in the whole scene, and Brother Leon is standing alone, watching this whole production as the ambulance draws near.
Dickens uses verbal irony in his description of the Monseigneur’s chocolate ritual by showing that he must have four men prepare his hot chocolate. If only three men to prepare his hot chocolate it is difficult for him to swallow it. “Yes. It took four men, all four a-blaze with gorgeous decoration”(108). This quote shows how Monseigneur needs specifically four men because each man has one job it has to do like give Monseigneur a napkin, “presented the favoured napkin”(108). “Monseigneur could swallow many things with ease, and was by some few sullen minds supposed to rather be rapidly swallowing France” (108). Dickens uses irony to show the ridiculous situation of the ritual to how France is being destroyed. He uses this to show the contrast as a lord to a servant.
	In The Chocolate War, the rising action was the majority of the story. At Trinity High School, the school that Jerry attends, there is a group of "elite" students called the Vigils. The Vigils give out "assignments" to random students at Trinity. Archie, the head, told the Goober that his assignment was to unscrew every screw in Room nineteen. The Goober spent several hours doing his assignment, and eventually finished with the assistance of a few Vigil members. As the story goes on, the reader learns that every year at Trinity, there is a chocolate sale run by the assistant head master, Brother Leon. The last major detail in the rising action was when Archie informed Jerry of his assignment, Jerry’s assignment was not to sell chocolates for the first ten days of the annual chocolate sale.
The first example is when Jerry refused to sell the chocolates saying “No, I'm not going to sell the chocolates.” The moment he says this the whole story really spirals into place, he doesn't sell them and now the perfect balance of the school is ruined. The second time where a major choice was made is when more kids started to catch on with Jerry's idea as seen here “I never thought of just saying no like you did.” This shows that after Jerry said no to selling the chocolates other kids started to join in and also not sell them. This happening in the school really makes a lot of the teachers mad and nervous and forces the Vigils to take severe action like they never had before.
The sad reality of life is that very few people fight oppression. Most talk about independence, but eventually most settle into a life that not even knowing someone else is in charge. In the Pit and the Pendulum, the narrator is ruled by his torturers and in Young Goodman Brown, the narrator is ruled by the Devil. Even though the narrator from the former story was ruled by his torturers, he maintained a more optimistic outlook on his challenges than Brown, who let the Devil take control and lost all hope in the world, proving that optimism is truly the key to success.
Why would a person decide to betray the beliefs they had fought so hard for? In Robert Cormiers novel The Chocolate War, the character of Jerry Renault changes drastically from a rebel to a follower in the end. The school gang known as the vigils and his moral beliefs motivates Jerry’s actions. He feels he must take a stand against evil. Jerry can be considered a hero because of his beliefs. In the end however he gives in to the things he fought against and becomes a follower.
Elena finds that her own life is hell, while living under the rule of her tyrannical mother.
An article called, “The Real War,” written by Roger J. Spiller, begins with a quote by Walt Whitman, “The real war will never get in the books.” The author writes about an interview with Paul Fussell, who was a soldier in World War Two and has written many books about World War One and World War Two. Fussell is very opinionated and critical about other books written about these wars, asserting they are not realistic or portray the true essence of what really occurred by soldiers and other people participating in the wars. I claim that it is impossible to convey the actual personal feelings and emotions of those involved in a war in books or any other forms of media.
A teacher, who had “an indescribable air of one who knew the world”, leads Goodman Brown from the cave. His teacher continually leads him along the path to enlightenment despite Goodman Brown’s attempts “to return whence I came.” Goodman Brown learns that people are not perfect and that “good” people sometimes do “bad” things. People who Goodman Brown views as perfect, like the governor and his Sunday school teacher are exposed as imperfect people who lie and cheat and steal by using the images of a stolen broom and a promise to be queen of Hell.
The journey of Goodman Brown must occur because it is an essential part of his growing up and becoming an adult. Ever since his discovery of sins in the people who he has always considered to be virtuous due to their involvement with the figure of evil, he has forever lost his innocence and faith in life. Similarly, Connie, a young girl at an age of innocence, has little knowledge about the dangers lurking in the adult world; hence, she is easily convinced by people around her. The moment Connie stands behind the screen door is when she’s on the brink of leaping into a new world. Indeed, she is standing in a threshold of adulthood and finds herself surrounded by temptations. She seems to be afraid but at the same time raising her curiosity about what awaits her behind that doorway to adulthood. In the end, her innocent stage of life is over as she falls into the grasp of Arnold
At the beginning of his journey, Goodman Brown’s will and pride were both embedded in the belief that he was a pious man. Goodman’s pride in piety evidently fails him, as he discovers that his faith was based on the principles of individuals who had sworn allegiance to the devil. This deplorable truth destroyed his conviction, and in this sense the devil prevailed against Goodman Brown.
Joseph Brodsky, a famous poet, once said, “There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.” Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. The Chocolate War, written by Robert Cormier, features a freshman student by the name of Jerry Renault that goes to Trinity High School. He has a confrontation with the gang also known as The Vigils. The Vigils is a gang headed by Archie Costello. They have these assignments that have to be completed on time and if they're not completed, they are then punished.