Rule #11: More Than It’s Gonna Hurt You: Concerning Violence
November 2, 2016 How To Read Lit 1 comment sweeks17
While reading a book, a death can just be a simple thing that it is read over and meaningless to the reader. However, it usually has a deeper meaning or could be meant to be a metaphor.
It’s almost impossible to figure out what violence means in a book. Authors do not usually introduce violence in a straightforward way. They make it the reader’s job to figure that out.
In order for violence to have a deeper meaning, it must be more than simply mayhem.
Violence is everywhere in literature: Wile E. Coyote, Faulkner’s Colonel Sartoris, Emma Bovary, Joyce’s Stephen Daedalus
In the entire Harry Potter series, there are so many meaningless deaths. While some have meaning, there are many where the reader is left uncertain of why that character was killed off. It is their job to figure out why. A similar movie where there are lots of deaths is The Hunger Games. However, in those movies and books, it is very clear why they are killed, but the reader is left unsure of the purpose, if there even is one. In the Harry Potter series, it was of the utmost importance that Harry’s parents die. If they hadn’t of died, there wouldn’t of been a story. A meaningless death though, would be when Fred died. There was no need for him to die because you already know that there were plenty of people who were willing to die for Harry, so there was absolutely no need for his death, making it meaningless.
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1 Comment
These are great examples and you wrote down all the rules in the chapter but maybe you could shorten them a little. Also I am not sure if you are saying the deaths seem meaningless because author’s kill their characters on purpose.
Example: The movie “Saving Private Ryan” has a lot of violence and death that has a deeper meaning. When it is discovered that three out of the four brothers from the Ryan family have been killed in action, the General sends Captain Miller to find and save the last Private Ryan. Captain Miller and his team put their life on the line to save one soldier. Although these deaths may seem meaningless at first, Private Ryan is returned home safe to his mother and tries his best to be an honorable man. These deaths symbolism what a soldier is willing to die to save one person. In the end Private Ryan is returned home and earns what the soldiers have done for him.