A Single Shard Analysis

A Single Shard by Linda Sue Park, talks about the personal growth of an orphan named Tree-ear. He lives with Crane-man in Ch’ulp’o who is an old, homeless man. After some while, he goes on a journey to deliver vases for his master, changes his life forever. The three events that most affected Tree-ear were his suffering nine days of punishment from Min, his receiving words of wisdom from Crane-man, and his journey to Songdo.
The first event that effected Tree-ear was the nine days of punishment. Tree-ear accidentally broke a vase made by the master potter, Min. It took him three days to make the vase, so Tree-ear had to work three times the amount it took to make it as a repayment. The nine-days of punishment was suffocating for Tree-ear. Tree-ear had learned that working hard was beneficial for himself …show more content…
At first when Tree-ear was on his journey to show Min’s pottery to the emissary, he was not brave. He got tired very fast and he wasn’t confident that he could complete the journey. However, when he meets two robbers, he stopped thinking about his fear and only the vase was important at that time. But the vases were flung into the air and crashed into the rocks far away. He knows that everything is going wrong and considers committing suicide from a mountain. But he hears Crane-man telling him, ‘leaping into death is not the only way to show true courage.’ After searching for a while, he sees that the pottery is broken into a melon shape. He only has one single shard, the size of his hand, but it gives him courage and he decides to continue to the end. The shard turns out to be proof that Min is a great potter, which the emissary admires and then gives Min the commission. Everything went wrong at first, but it turned out to be good in the end, which makes him become confident in his own abilities and