Ernest Hemingway once said that "The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them." He clearly knew that the only way to know if you could trust someone is to give them a chance to break their trust. The theme of the story, The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi, is to know people before you trust them, for not everyone can be trusted. The author first develops a theme when Charlotte tries to give the dirk back to Zachariah he tells her that she may never know what might happen and that she needs to keep it to stay safe. Charlotte didn 't know what she would need to stay safe from because that Zachariah never described it clearly to her so she didn 't trust him about needing the dirk. Later she even wanted to throw it overboard! If Charlotte had truly known who she should trust, (Zachariah and not Captain Jaggery) it would have saved her a lot of trouble like being seen with the dirk and later being accused of owning the dirk and killing Mr. Hollybrass. All in all, if Charlotte had known who to trust she would have known that Zachariah could be trusted and that it was Captain Jaggery who was untrustworthy. A few chapters later the author once …show more content…
So, first, if Charlotte had known who to trust she would have known that Zachariah could be trusted and that it was Captain Jaggery who was untrustworthy. Then Cranic wouldn’t be dead and Zachariah wouldn’t have to hide out in the brig. Finally, if Charlotte had known that Keetch could not be trusted and didn’t tell him about the plan, then she would have been able to start the mutiny again instead of being caught by Captain Jaggery. In conclusion, the author of this story has shown that the theme of this novel is to know people before you trust them, for not everyone can be