The Seventh Man Analysis

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Recommended: Effects of child abuse

Nicholus Crooks
Per. 2

Seventh Man Essay

“The Seventh Man” is about a man, who is faced with an incredibly traumatic experience as a kid and how it affects his life from that point on. He has this experience while he is at the beach with his friend, K. While playing near the water, he noticed large waves about to hit the shore right where K. was. He told himself, “run over to K., grab hold of him, and get out of there... I knew that the wave was coming, but K. didn’t know.” Rather than following his instinct, he ran the other way. K. ends up being taken by the wave and never seen again. The decision of running away instead of helping his friend has a ripple effect on his life and continues to torture him into adulthood. I believe that the …show more content…

Until this tragic event, the man felt like life was exciting, but after he was full of fear and regret. I believe the giant wave represents the fear inside him. This can be seen in lines 9-10, “It was the biggest wave I had ever seen in my life, a strange wave, an absolute giant.” Murakami uses this hyperbole to show how afraid the man was because when he saw it as a child it might have looked bigger than it actually was. I feel that many people would react in the same way he did, but he still blames himself for not rescuing K. In his eyes, the wave was so large that it crippled him to the point that he was not able to save his best friend from being “swallowed” by the wave. This experience had a great impact on his life. He was filled with shame, guilt, and regret over the loss of K. I feel that if this happened to I would always be disappointed in myself for the choice made. He often thought to himself, “it would have been close, but as I went over the timing of the events in my memory, it always seemed to me that I could have made it. As I said before, though, overcome with fear, I abandoned him there and saved only myself.” This quote explains how he feels that he could have done something, but chose to run away & save only

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