Freedom In Crispin's The Awakening

“Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.”(Voltaire). Many of us have grown up in a world that is fairly free and haven’t really gotten oppressed or anything like that. Now this hasn’t always been true. Many people used to get oppressed and treated badly because of their race, religion and even just because of what social class they were born into. Crispin was born into the peasant and the serf class so he had basically no human rights. Now today everyone would be really upset because everyone deserves basic human rights and freedom, but back then it was not odd to not have certain freedoms. In fact, it was probably more odd if you were a peasant or serf with freedoms because that simply just didn’t happen. That was definitely the case in

At the beginning of the book, Crispin has no idea about what freedom is or how you get to freedom. This is shown a couple times, particularly during the scene that is after Crispin finding out he has been declared a wolf’s head, which is someone deemed less than human and can be killed by anyone. After that scene Father Quinel tells Crispin that Crispin should run to one of the big towns like Great Wexly and if he can stay under the radar for one year and a day that he would be free. Father Quinel even says that Crispin could be anything he even says that he could be a knight or a lord or even a king. After Father Quinel tells Crispin this stuff he is extremely

Crispin listens to Bear tell his stories and adventures and learns more of the world. There is one particular story that really stuck out to Crispin and that was the story of how Bear changed his stars. The story goes that Bear’s father gave Bear away to a convent and Bear was to become a monk. Well then one day Bear saw the performers in the square and realized that that was what he wanted to do. So Bear did the only logical thing and ran away from the Convent. This shows Crispin that you can change your life and your fate. Unfortunately, Crispin still belittles himself and even says that he is nothing because he has no name, no family, no one who even cares about him and that so many people want to kill him. Crispin says many things like this throughout the book like when Bear gives him the choice of going with him to Great Wexly Crispin insists that he can’t make the choice because he’s just a servant. Also during this time Bear teaches Crispin that work does pay off in the end shown here “Honest pay for honest work. And you deserve some too.”(Avi 151). This is very new idea to Crispin considering when he lived in the village he barely made enough to survive no matter how hard he