College Week: Divergent Study
Questions 1, 5 & 9
In my opinion, Beatrice was not a reliable narrator. She spoke in the first person throughout the whole novel, on page 29 Beatrice says “I open my eyes and walk to the front of the observation room”, she only relates to herself and does not always tell the truth neither does she always know the truth. For instance, Beatrice’s older brother Caleb wanted to know her fraction after the choosing ceremony and she refused to share this piece of information with him. In chapter thirty-three, Dauntless army gets to Abnegation headquarters and starts killing people. This shows that Beatrice doesn’t know the entire truth of Dauntless. In the beginning she has no clue what Erudite is going to make Dauntless do to the Abnegation. In the end they hurt the faction she was born into. Tris speaks in the first person and she not only relates to herself but she doesn’t make the reader interested by using the word “I” repetitively. The roll of the narrator is to tell the story from all views and perspectives, not only his or hers. Divergent was not a clear example of that. In the novel Beatrice talks a lot about herself. This does not mean that she is selfish but maybe she feels like she is the one that is being attacked the most because her family’s faction and Abnegation (the faction she was born into) is being attacked. Beatrice is one who tries to be somebody that she isn’t and she tries to become brave and courageous. I think she wants to fit into the society of being a born-initiate within Dauntless.
In this novel, there are a few things that do not get explained like what Dauntless Is protecting the city from. I feel that the narrator and the author should have given more information but, it was a smart choice by the author because it allows us as the readers to want to read the other books. The thing that I am most curious about is what will happen to these factions in the end. Will Candor and Amity remain the good ones? Nobody knows. The way that the book was written surely made me curious to attempt reading the second book. It did not make me believe in this dystopian world. I knew that this wasn’t a real world and couldn’t be real. There is not a perfect world or a world of just war but there are groups in almost every society. In the end of the novel the author mentions what she wanted this novel to be like and I think she did a good job by explaining dystopian and utopian societies to the readers.
Questions 3 & 4
The fractionless is a status within the community of Divergent. They are not only fractionless but, they are picked on and cannot be welcomed into any of the fractions even if they wanted to be. This is described as being homeless and almost close to death because, they have to suffer. It is a common practice for Abnegation to help them. The fractionless do have a role in the city and this role is to do the work within the city that nobody wants to do, such as collecting garbage, being janitors, operators of the trains and buses. As a reward for doing all of this they receive small amounts of food and clothes but not enough to survive. Most of the time they feel like dying. It is hard for the fractionless to be a victim of their own society.
In Niagara Christian Community of Schools there are a lot of people that would fit into the factionless situation. In the book factionless are a group of people who do work for others and it is reality in this particular school. There are many times when a group of people such as bullies, may send others to do things for them and these acts would be known as threats. In every society there are those people who are healers, bystanders, perpetrators and victims which we identify in the book.
The five factions are; Candor, Amity, Dauntless, Erudite and Abnegation, these factions can be related to NCC’s community. In this novel the author wants this particular society to be one that is utopian. When a specific place is set up to be perfect society it does not always turn out this way. Some people might think that because NCC is a Christian school it has to be a utopian society but it is like any other community.
The author of this book wanted the society to start out as being seen in a perfect way but later realized this was almost impossible. On page 5 of the book she speaks about why people might enjoy reading about dystopian society’s compared to utopian stories. I think that this novel is one that is made for us all to realize that there is no perfect society and it cannot possibly happen. There are definitely some good aspects of this book that we can use to better our community and should have in our real world. The fact that Candor and Amity are full of peace and honesty is good. Candor and Amity are all about honesty but I do not think that this can happen in any society. This should be a part of today’s society because we as children of God should try to set up Utopian societies even if they may fail. God originally wanted the world to be a utopian society but because we are all sinful human beings this failed to happen.
Questions 11-14
The chapters in the book do not end in cliffhangers. They end with a full explanation of what has happened. They answer all the question, for example, in chapter sixteen Beatrice says, “We started stage one with nine initiates. Now we have seven.” The way that the book portrays this information is very blunt and sharp. It allows us as the reader to think deeply into the story and almost every chapter ends with a short and direct statement. In the book some of the quotes are twists, for example, in chapter fifteen Beatrice ends the page by saying that her mom is Dauntless and this opens up a whole new chapter for us. We begin to think about why and how she became Dauntless. This would be a twist. Some of the chapters do end with answering questions but not all. When Beatrice makes statements such as “my hair blew in my face, I don’t’ know why” this makes me want to keep reading because, I wonder why this happened and makes me wonder if she found this piece of information out. This makes the reader want to read from chapter to chapter by the way that the author portrays the book and makes short statements making you wonder what happened next and it is almost like a mystery.
In my opinion, the supplementary material in the back of the book allows us as the readers to see what each faction is supposed to be and, wants to be. I feel that the manifestoes guided me in a way that I was able to get a better understanding of the book in the sense that they explained what they were meant to be but, did not fully become. If it was written into the book there would be no mysteries. If there were mysteries, it would help us as the readers want to read the other books and allow us to appreciate the novel more because of its creativity.
I think that story will continue with this dystopian society and will end with a dystopian society. In the end of everything there is not a perfect society. We live in sinful society and the author of Divergent cannot change this to be utopian. I say this because, God is the only person who can make the world perfect and nobody can change that. We all want this society that is like Candor and Amity but, truthfully will never happen. I think that in the end there will be a faction that tries to help and tries to heal the city but, will fail. I believe that the characters will learn about themselves as a whole and learn that nobody is perfect or that the society in which they live in. It is hard to control your city and your country because it not only takes more than one person but, it takes the work of God. For example, Martin Luther King tried to integrate blacks and whites. Did this work? Yes, but, it never continued. Martin Luther King owns a very famous speech “I have a dream” he said. He wanted this utopian society but once again the society did not allow this to happen due to the fact that we are not perfect and we have a fatal flaw which allows things like this to go wrong.
In our world today we all have bad societies and no matter who tries to step in and help those society’s they will never be utopian. But may be for a short period of time. It will always fail.
If I were to create a faction, the name of this faction would be called Restoration, they would live underground. This name suits the faction because, they would be the healers of the city and the reason for living underground is because, they know the story all along but do not come visible until everything in the city is totally being destroyed. The strengths of this faction would be the power of being able to sit back and watch the city fight and then being able to come out and do something very powerful to help everyone not just one faction. Their role would be to bring peace to the divergent community and to the characters who are the victims. I think this could and may be successful if it were real.
