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Abuse Of Power In Nightjohn By T. Waller

875 Words4 Pages

To begin with, in NightJohn, the theme of power is often abused is exemplified by Waller. In the novel, NightJohn, Waller abuses the power he has and uses his power in a negative way. Waller is a man with great power and buys slaves. If the slaves break one of Waller’s rules, Waller will punish them, while making all the other slaves watch. Waller does many things to hurt the slaves, like running them, whipping them, hitting them, letting dogs chew at them, and even leaving them dangling in shackles for days and nights. Waller also takes joy in seeing people get hurt. In the article, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,” it mainly talks about a bird who is trapped in a cage, and its wings are clipped. Someone has done this to the bird and is using …show more content…

In addition, in the novel, NightJohn, the character Waller abuses his power by hurting his slaves and takes pride and satisfaction in doing it. Waller owns a lot of land, power, and slaves. Due to this, he has people working for him all day and enjoys the pleasure of watching them suffer, and fight to hold themselves together. Waller wants the slaves to do what he says and if they don’t, he treats them terribly and in harsh ways. There is one very important slave, named John. John is a runaway slave who has been treated terribly, and has been beaten a great number of times. Waller doesn’t care that John has been suffering, but he does enjoy torturing him and getting what he wants. In the text, it states, “Standing in the sun with the …show more content…

The bird also symbolizes how people go too far with the amount of power they have. The bird has clipped wings, is trapped in a cage, and its feet are tied up, which means that the bird has no escape. The bird has no freedom and has no way to escape, because it cannot walk or run. Since the bird is being abused and has no power, it is traumatized and explains how its life is like a nightmare. In the text, it states, “His shadow shouts on a nightmare scream/his wings are clipped and his feet are tied” (Angelou paragraph 5). This quote shows that the bird is treated very unfairly and that the bird no longer has power. Also, the bird’s wings give it freedom to fly and survive in the wild, which it no longer has. This is an example of how power can be often abused, when put in the hands of the wrong people. Thus, the birds power and freedom has been taken away from it, becasue someone could not control their

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Numerous things have occurred in history that most people either believes is false, or denies that it has happened, one of which being slavery. In the realistic fiction novel NightJohn by Gary Paulsen, Paulsen describes the life of Sarny as she goes through the struggle of being slave. Information such as brutality, family seperation, and acts of kindness can be corroborated with Nightjohn through Fredrick Douglass, Mingo White, and Solomon Northup. Multiple examples of brutality can be seen in Nightjohn, the most prominent being whipping and the use of dogs to hunt down slaves. The first act of brutality to be read is whipping, where Sarny reports that slaves would be whipped for going too slow.

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Do you think losing a friend or not getting to go over to a friends house or even not eating what you want for dinner is a big deal? See what slaves had to go through and what they were forced to do. The short historical novel “NightJohn” is about how the owner named Waller, the man that lived in the white house bought a slave named Nightjohn, man that didn’t give any reactions to being beaten and taught Sarny, a young girl born into slavery how to read, write, and tell numbers even when it was against the rules. Although Gary Paulsen’s novel, NightJohn, is considered historical fiction, the descriptions of families splitting up, strength of the people, and learning how to read, write, and knowing numbers. Women that were breeders were separated from their babies after 12 months of raising and feeding them and then the child is sent to slavery and raised by some other women.

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