Adult in Disguise
When a six-year-old is mentioned, most people think of a kid who can count to ten, who is learning how to write, or a kid that wants their parents to play with them. However, Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game embraces the idea of an adult in a child’s body. The protagonist, Ender Wiggin, is the third child of family geniuses and the only one who qualified for Battle School. At the age of six, he is stripped from his family’s side and is placed with the fate of humanity in his hands. His duty is to destroy the aliens that have invaded Earth and have attempted to destroy the human species twice. Ender’s Game is an intriguing story during the future about discovering your identity and what it means to be human (a.k.a. a child). …show more content…
After the beating Stilson got from Ender, Ender leaned his head against the wall of the corridor and cried until the bus came. He questions the person he sees in the mirror, and says, “I am just like Peter. Take my monitor away, and I am just like Peter” (8). Ender is worried about Peter's reaction when he finds out about the removal of Ender’s monitor. He frets that he might turn into the vicious, abusive Peter now that he has his monitor taken out. The reader can recognize that Ender is almost as scared of turning into Peter as he is about being killed by Peter. In addition to not discovering his identity, Ender ponders what it will be like to just be a regular boy. When other boys in his launch laugh, he does the contrary of that. As he sees them joking around, he toys with the idea of trying to be like the other boys (28). He is left with a bunch of responsibilities at a very young age that not many boys in the Battle School have. He often wonders if he even acts like his age, seeing how the other boys are having more fun than him. The commanders rely on him to save the world from the invasion of Buggers, but why him he wonders. Does he have something that the much older soldiers do not have? Most of Ender’s confusion and identity problems comes from his worry that he is a bully and a killer, like Peter. What he does not know, is that he is not like Peter, but he is also not like his sister …show more content…
It is the defining feature of the protagonist of Ender’s Game. Ender proves his point that he is the greatest soldier in Battle School to Graff and Major Anderson, when he says, “You want to make me the best soldier possible. Go down and look at the standings. Look at the all-time standings. So far you're doing an excellent job with me. Congratulations. Now when are you going to put me up against a good army?” (191). Ender is an exceptional soldier and leader and the reason he plays the games so well is his ability to understand the enemy and inspire loyalty. The only thing saving him is compassion. In agreement with Sparknotes.com, “If not for his compassion, he would have been turned into an automaton; he would have become either a killing machine or a power-hungry creature like Peter.” During the end of the book, Ender promises the queen of the Buggers that he will find her a new home due to the invasion he got tricked into doing. He and Valentine went on a spaceship to go from world to world and always Ender had a dry white cocoon with him, looking for a place where the queen of the Buggers could awaken and thrive in peace (324). Ender’s compassion for the Buggers gets him through the idea that he destroyed their race, but now will be able to help them start a new civilization. He seeks to atone for his sin by searching for a new home for the surviving Bugger queen. Ender proves that in the
When a six-year-old is mentioned, most people think of a kid who can count to ten, who is learning how to write, or a kid that wants their parents to play with them. However, Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game embraces the idea of an adult in a child’s body. The protagonist, Ender Wiggin, is the third child of family geniuses and the only one who qualified for Battle School. At the age of six, he is stripped from his family’s side and is placed with the fate of humanity in his hands. His duty is to destroy the aliens that have invaded Earth and have attempted to destroy the human species twice. Ender’s Game is an intriguing story during the future about discovering your identity and what it means to be human (a.k.a. a child). …show more content…
After the beating Stilson got from Ender, Ender leaned his head against the wall of the corridor and cried until the bus came. He questions the person he sees in the mirror, and says, “I am just like Peter. Take my monitor away, and I am just like Peter” (8). Ender is worried about Peter's reaction when he finds out about the removal of Ender’s monitor. He frets that he might turn into the vicious, abusive Peter now that he has his monitor taken out. The reader can recognize that Ender is almost as scared of turning into Peter as he is about being killed by Peter. In addition to not discovering his identity, Ender ponders what it will be like to just be a regular boy. When other boys in his launch laugh, he does the contrary of that. As he sees them joking around, he toys with the idea of trying to be like the other boys (28). He is left with a bunch of responsibilities at a very young age that not many boys in the Battle School have. He often wonders if he even acts like his age, seeing how the other boys are having more fun than him. The commanders rely on him to save the world from the invasion of Buggers, but why him he wonders. Does he have something that the much older soldiers do not have? Most of Ender’s confusion and identity problems comes from his worry that he is a bully and a killer, like Peter. What he does not know, is that he is not like Peter, but he is also not like his sister …show more content…
It is the defining feature of the protagonist of Ender’s Game. Ender proves his point that he is the greatest soldier in Battle School to Graff and Major Anderson, when he says, “You want to make me the best soldier possible. Go down and look at the standings. Look at the all-time standings. So far you're doing an excellent job with me. Congratulations. Now when are you going to put me up against a good army?” (191). Ender is an exceptional soldier and leader and the reason he plays the games so well is his ability to understand the enemy and inspire loyalty. The only thing saving him is compassion. In agreement with Sparknotes.com, “If not for his compassion, he would have been turned into an automaton; he would have become either a killing machine or a power-hungry creature like Peter.” During the end of the book, Ender promises the queen of the Buggers that he will find her a new home due to the invasion he got tricked into doing. He and Valentine went on a spaceship to go from world to world and always Ender had a dry white cocoon with him, looking for a place where the queen of the Buggers could awaken and thrive in peace (324). Ender’s compassion for the Buggers gets him through the idea that he destroyed their race, but now will be able to help them start a new civilization. He seeks to atone for his sin by searching for a new home for the surviving Bugger queen. Ender proves that in the