Blue Water Djinn Character Analysis

In “Balto” written by T. Coraghessan Boyle and “Blue Water Djinn” by Tea Obreht both of the main characters mature and have a turning point in their lives that leads them to ultimately mature at the end/resolution of the story. “Balto” is about a girl who is told to lie for her father in court in order for him to not have his children taken away. In the story the father is an alcoholic who picks his children up from school late and drunk. When he does this he also hits a kid on a bike and asks his 12 year old daughter to drive. His lawyer tells the daughter, Angelle, that he is going to get charged with driving under the influence and endangerment of children. If he’s found guilty of endangering his children, as in driving drunk, then he will

He is a young boy who is told a made up story just to scare him from going into the water and out to the ship. One night when he sees the Frenchmen drowning that’s what he thinks is going on, “The water djinn were carrying the Frenchman away” (541). The man was just being taken away by the riptide and was unable to swim but Jack believed it was the djinn. Fawad, Jacks caretaker had explained the djinn to him, “He has seen their lights around the ship at night, the green glow of their underwater torches, and he imagines them hovering in the water-worn doorways, their mouths red with the flesh of men, their wrists bracelet in seaweed, singing, weaving moonbeams into their hair” (536) He deeply believes that they’re real, one day when the tide is low he becomes curious and walks out to the boat. When Jack is first talking about the ship he explains, “For Jack, the ship is the edge of the world, and it has sat there, on the lip of his knowledge, for as long as he can remember” (535). This is very important to think of when Jack finally goes out to the ship. It is explained that he believed this was the end of the world this was the most he really thought of in the world. When he goes out to the ship this can be seen as him broadening his horizons and learning new things about the world, in other words maturing. He walks to the ship and doesn’t see what he was expecting, “The inside of the ship is black, swollen with dark water. But then his eyes adjust and the moon comes out from behind a bank of cloud. Shafts of light fall through the gnarled holes in the metal and slice the green water inside” (543). He does not see any djinn and is matured by this. He is also matured when he watches the man drown and this leads Jack to think of looking out at the ship and to think that maybe what he has been told isn’t