Elwood's Abuse In 'The Nickel Boys'

Coleman Hinkie

Ms. Burgess

Pre-AP English 9

3 March 2023

Elwood's battle against abuse

On the night of April 1, 1712, several enslaved men set fire to a house in New York City, and when white enslavers arrived to put it out, nine of the enslavers were killed (peoplenotproperty.hudsonvalley.org). Even hundreds of years before the civil rights movement, black people who were subjected to extreme injustice fought back and resisted, demonstrating to other enslaved people that fighting back is worthwhile. Colson Whitehead explores the idea of resistance in the novel The Nickel Boys. One character, Elwood, is very passionate about this subject. He closely follows the words of Martin Luther King Jr. and is shaped by this idea of resistance. Colson

Elwood is a compassionate person who seeks justice not only for himself and individuals like him but for everyone. After getting jumped for telling on a group of shoplifters, Elwood ponders, "How to tell them that their transgressions against Mr. Marconi were insults to Elwood himself, whether it was a sucker candy or a comic book?" (Whitehead 27). Despite the fact that Elwood is black and, at the time, white people were exceedingly prejudiced, Mr. Marconi, the store owner, took Elwood in and gave him a job. He is devoted to Mr. Marconi and values him greatly for doing this. Elwood's values forbid him from letting the boys get away with theft, even if Mr. Marconi had warned him not to inform him about the boys. Even though he is aware of the consequences, he continues to oppose injustice. As he ages, Elwood is influenced by other people's actions of resistance and uses these to help him develop his principles. He is surprised when his teacher tells the class, "That always burned me up,' he said, ‘seeing that stuff. You all are trying to get an education- no need to get caught up with what those fools say.'" Elwood and his

When his days there begin to fly by and he stops fighting back, he realizes, "It wasn't Spencer that undid him, or a supervisor or a new antagonist slumbering in room 2, rather it was that he'd stopped fighting. In keeping his head down, in his careful navigation so that he made it to lights-out without mishap, he fooled himself that he had prevailed. That he had outwitted Nickel because he got along and kept out of trouble. In fact he has been ruined" (155-156). Once he stops resisting, he has succumbed to what Nickel wants him to do. In his method of trying to get through the ranks by simply following the school's rules, he's stopped following his passion. This highlights the importance of resistance in situations of oppression and injustice. While it may seem easier to comply and go along with the rules, this led to a loss of Elwood’s true self and values. Once he has recovered his mental strength, he makes a connection between his circumstances and those of history, as well as Martin Luther King Jr.'s speeches and words. When considering telling the truth about the school to the inspectors, Elwood remembers, "They had whipped Elwood. But he took the whipping and was still here. There was nothing they could do that white people hadn't done to black people before, were not doing at this moment somewhere in Montgomery and Baton Rouge,