Themes In Rodman Philbrick's Freak The Mighty

You don’t know how powerful friendship really is until you meet a friend who changes your life, like Max and Freak. To start off, in the Award winning Novel, Freak the Mighty, Written by Rodman Philbrick, An over-sized Learning Disabled seventh grader, and an under-sized Morquio Syndrome fighter brainiac learn how the power of friendship can change your life in a major way. Quests, Adventures, and teamwork help them “rise above” all the challenges that come their way including family and Classmates. On that note, After reading Rodman Philbrick's realistic-fiction Novel, there were two themes that Really stood out. They two themes are that friendship is so powerful that it can change someone’s life in a major way. The other theme is that the ability of teamwork can help you rise above all the challenges in life.

Max (over-sized and learning disabled seventh grader) and Freak (undersized brainiac) both start off with no friends. They both

needed someone that they can count on, and they found that person. Each other. The biggest theme in Freak the Mighty is that friendship can be so powerful that it can change someone's life in a major way. Both of the characters were left out, and they learned the meaning of friendship when they met each other. On page 160, Max says, “Maxwell Kane, you haven’t got a brain, and that’s the truth, the whole truth, the unvanquished truth is how freak would say it. So I wrote the unvanquished truth down.” Max wrote a book because he was either inspired by his and Freak’s story or Freak influenced him. If he didn’t have Freak, he would be nowhere. This changed his life in a major way, because he becomes smarter, and his understanding that he can do a lot of things by being friends with Freak. In addition, The reader finds out that, when Freak was talking about a difficult word, and Max said that he knew it because he looked it up in the dictionary (pg 98). From that evidence, we know that Freak is usually the one to look words up in the Dictionary, and Max was once again influenced by Freak’s smart mind. Max is Learning disabled, and it is hard for him to read, but he went out of his way to look something up in the dictionary. This is changing his life because he is once again becoming smarter and more self-reliant. Max and Freak have been through a lot alone, and even more together. Imagine how Max felt when he finally had someone to talk to. Imagine how Freak felt when he had someone to share all of his creations with. They both needed each other to make life a lot easier.

Teamwork is working together to make life a little easier, and teamwork happens to be part of the next major theme in Freak the Mighty. The next theme is, the ability of teamwork can help you rise above all the challenges in life. When Max and Freak work as a team, they can conquer anything that comes their way. On page 35, Freak helps Max get away from Tony D and the gang, by kicking the side of Freak’s body to tell him which way to go. Even though Freak led max into the lake, they still get away from Tony D and the gang. They work as a team to get themselves out of trouble. Max was the “hero” to Grim and Gram because the police said that he saved Freak. The fair Gwen was very thankful for Max. In addition, Freak yells,“ ‘I got a squirt gun and a chemistry set for christmas…Sulfuric Acid.’” In this Example, we see how Freak tells Killer Kane that he has acid in his squirt gun, Killer Kane doesn’t believe him until he squirts it and he thinks that his eyes are burning from the Acid. Freak helped Max, and just saved him from almost getting Killed. Once Again, they are working together to get themselves out of trouble. Freak loves helping Max and Max loves helping Freak. Even though they are different sizes, and have have different interests, they still work good together as a team, and they work even better as friends.

In conclusion, there are two major themes in the novel Freak the Mighty.

These themes resemble the lessons that this book gave. The two themes are that friendship is so powerful that it can change someone's life in a major way. Also, how the ability of teamwork can help you rise above all the challenges in life. Both Max and Freak resemble these two themes in major ways. Friendship is like a gold chain, each link is a memory from the past to present. There was a statement that came up numerous times, which is, “you can remember anything whether it happened or not.” Max always thinks back to the time with Freak in daycare and he relates it to the present. These are the main themes in Freak the Mighty a realistic-fiction by Rodman Philbrick. Both Max and Freak are totally different, but yet they still work together like Peanut butter and Jelly! Friendship and teamwork is everything in life. Do you have someone in your life who you know you can always count on? If not, find that person. Like how max and Freak found each

other.