Part One. Spiritual Death in the Novel
The Chocolate War is about the different types of deaths we face when we compromise our individual conscience for power, conformity, and corruption, as Jerry does throughout the novel. One type of death Jerry suffers is the death of the identity of himself that he values:
1. His image of self as being courageous is gone for he realizes he is a coward who is manipulated by Archie to fight, not out of courage, but by pressure to defend his “manhood” and by revenge.
2. His image as a compassionate man is gone as he sees he can be calloused and apathetic, a slave to the barbarian tribal code, as he participates in the final fight.
3. His image as a moral man is gone during the fight when he sees his dead mother casting an admonishing gaze upon him, showing that he has betrayed her, by betraying the values she taught him.
4. His image as being loyal to his mother is gone as he realizes pride and self-preservation triumphs over all other interests.
Thus the novel is dealing with the death of the self, in a spiritual or psychological sense, much more than it is dealing with physical death.
Part Three: Today’s Essay Variation:
Jerry is a complex character. He is neither simply heroic, worthy of our sympathy and admiration nor simply a “failure,” worthy of our scorn and contempt. Argue that Jerry’s moral complexities defy simple analysis with a thesis that might look like this:
Jerry is a sympathetic character full of moral contradictions that include ______________________, __________________, __________________, and _______________________________.
Some moral complexities of Jerry:
One. He sees the futility and mediocrity of his father’s spineless, complacent existence but fails to see that his father deals with his wife’s death by withdrawing.
Two. Jerry is wise to see the folly of becoming complacent to a life of conforming mediocrity like his father, but then he conforms to violence and the “man code” by participating in the fight at the end of the novel.
Three. Jerry is bold to defy the chocolate sale, Brother Leon and the Vigils, but one could argue that it’s not his free will that is doing the defiance, merely the depression from losing his mother. Less depressed, would he conform like everyone else?
Four. Jerry sees the malignancy that roils beneath Trinity High and the Vigils but he capitulates to the psychological warfare of Archie.
Part Four. Archie Is a Satanic Figure
One. Like Satan, Archie is full of pride and has blind faith that his superior intellect gives him the upper hand with others.
Two. Like Satan, Archie has contempt for the human race ("We're all bastards," he says in the novel). Having contempt means you believe every person has a price and that every person enjoys watching the humiliation and failure of others. This is called schadenfreude.
Three. Like Satan, Archie lives in eternal exile, apart from the human race. Archie is insufferably lonely and disconnected from others he attempts to compensate for his misery by exercising power.
Four. Like Satan, Archie is so proudful that he'd rather rule in hell that serve in heaven. That is to say, he prefers to live in his lonely world and marinate in his self-centered existence.
Five. Like Satan, Archie is the master of rationalization and manipulation. He can pull BS out of his you know what to trick others and suck them into his schemes.
Six. Like Satan, Archie easily rejects moral absolutes and moral values because he rationalizes that he is superior to others and thus lives beyond the moral sphere. Morality doesn't apply to him. What does? Moral relativism. You make up whatever morality you want depending on the circumstances.
Part Five. The Difference Between a General and a Specific Thesis. It's the Difference Between a Failed and Successful Essay.
A general thesis is too broad, too blah, and has a limp lackluster quality.
A specific thesis is razor-sharp in its focus, fiery, and sometimes argumentative.
Examples of a General Thesis
The Chocolate War is a deterministic novel.
Determinism imbues the novel's characters.
The characters cannot escape determinism and are doomed to a life without free will.
More Specific Thesis Statements Addressing Determinism
The Chocolate War affords us a dark vision of the world, one stripped of free will and taken over by determinism. This unforgiving determinism is the result of _________, __________, ___________, and ___________.
General Thesis Examples
A world of determinism can never rise above the despair of nihilism.
Nihilism is the novel's major mood and produces the novel's major theme.
The novel's characters cannot escape nihilism.
Improved Thesis Statement Addressing Nihilism
The novel's nihilism comes from Cormier's pessimistic view of human nature, which can be characterized by __________, ____________, __________, and _______________.
General Thesis Examples
Archie is Satan.
Archie's supercilious air makes him a satanic figure.
Archie has a devilish way about him.
Archie's devilish manner makes him repulsive.
More Specific Thesis That Addresses Archie's Satanic Aspects
While not devil's equal, we can see that Archie's psychology has many qualities in common with that Fallen Angel Lucifer. The most striking similarities include __________, __________, ______________, and _____________.
Part Six. Putting All the Essay Topics on One Post
Essay Topic One.
Tribalism, Symbiosis, Obedience to Authority, Conformity, Determinism, and Individual Conscience in The Chocolate War
In page one, analyze the forces in the novel that would compel us to call it a “dark vision of the human condition.” Some people might call this dark vision the condition of nihilism.
Then in the second page, start your thesis paragraph in which you connect the themes to the dangers of obedience as it relates to power, authority, and symbiosis. Because this is your multiple-source research paper, you will need to connect the novel’s themes to themes outside the text. You may, for example, look at the theme of obedience in the context of Stanley Milgram’s famous experiments or the abuse of power in the Stanford Experiment.
A thesis might look like this: The Chocolate War shows the demands of tribalism, which compromises our humanity by ________________________, _____________________________, _________________________, and _______________________________.
In your final page, you will write about how you or someone you know had a conflict between individual conscience and conformity during a “peer pressure” situation that revealed the “tiger’s claw of tribalism.” You conclusion will tie in your personal account with your novel analysis.
Your body paragraphs will correspond to the components you use to fill in the above blanks. Your conclusion will be one sentence, a brief, dramatic restatement of your thesis. Your final page, your Works Cited page, will show the sources you used from The Chocolate War, from my blog, from interviews, or from other helpful sources you find. Your Works Cited page and manuscript must conform to MLA format. Be sure to make your own catchy, creative title.
Essay Topic Two
One Way of Approaching the Essay Assignment (If I Were Writing It)
In my first page, I would write about a time I compromised my humanity by conforming to some unwritten law, like the time I fought Ron Reynolds because he had said something in PE that had insulted me. I wasn’t really mad, but punched him to “defend my honor,” then felt guilty afterwards.
In my second page, I’d argue that The Chocolate War is about the dehumanization that occurs from power, conformity, and blind obedience. In my body paragraphs I’d show how Jerry, Goober, Brother Leon, and Archie compromised their humanity through blind obedience and the worship of power. In the process, I’d compare these characters to the awful truths learned in the Milgram and Stanford Experiments.
Essay Topic Three
Essay Variation Based on Determinism:
Analyze the lack of free will in Jerry, Archie, Brother Leon, Obie, and Goober as it evident in the novel.
Suggested Structure: In your first page, explain the difference between free will and determinism using appropriate example. Then in your thesis argue that free will is lacking in the novel’s characters who are beholden to psychological (irrational passions) and external determinism. The deterministic forces from which they have no free will are the lust for power, pride, corruption, revenge, the impulse to disdain the powerless, the pressure to conform, and the pressure to be obedient.
Essay Topic Four.
The Chocolate War is about the different types of deaths we face when we compromise our individual conscience for power, conformity, and corruption, as several characters do throughout the novel.
Essay Topic Five.
Jerry is a complex character. He is neither simply heroic, worthy of our sympathy and admiration nor simply a “failure,” worthy of our scorn and contempt. Argue that Jerry’s moral complexities defy simple analysis with a thesis that might look like this:
Jerry is a sympathetic character full of moral contradictions that include ______________________, __________________, __________________, and _______________________________.
Essay Topic Six.
Analyze the psychological warfare that Archie uses throughout the novel. Here are some things to consider: Why is he effective at manipulating others? How does he use psychology over brute force to assert his power? What nihilistic assumptions does he make about human nature in order to exploit others?
Essay Topic Seven.
Compare and contrast the evil evident in Archie and Brother Leon throughout the novel. Which character is more evil and why?
Essay Topic Eight: This essay was generated from two students who didn't "connect" with the other essay options: Compare Archie and Brother Leon's character flaws. Consider the following: cowardice, sadism, nihilism, and intellectual pride (leading to blindness).
Part Five. Journal Entry
Of the several topics, which one interests you the most and why.
Part Six. Research Paper Sources for your Works Cited Page
Alienation in The Chocolate War
The book's nihilism offends a school, which wants a petition to ban it!
The Chocolate War: Still Tasting Good
Why The Chocolate War Was Banned
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