Callum and Sephy's Emotional Journey

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Callum and Sephy’s Emotional Journey

By Soumya 9NA

This book ‘Noughts and Crosses’ originally written by Malorie Blackman is about two people – Callum and Sephy- who are from opposite sides of society but are madly in LOVE. A play was derived from the book by Dominic Cooke and was performed by the Royal Shakespeare company in civic, Stratford-upon-Avon on the 29th of November 2007.

In the book there are two sides of society, the Noughts and the Crosses.  The noughts are the white people and the Crosses are the black People. This is very different form our current society as today all the White (Nought) people have the power whereas in the book the Black (Cross) people have all the power.

Sephy, whose full name is Persephone Hadley, is a cross and is extremely rich because he father is the Deputy Prime Minister. Callum on the other hand is a nought and is extremely poor because only his father works. In their world, White noughts and Black crosses simply don’t mix- and they certainly don’t fall in love. But that is exactly what they have done.

Callum’s mother used to work for Sephy’s mum, that’s how they met each other, while Callum’s mum was working he was allowed to play with Sephy in the Hadley’s huge rose garden. His mum was the Housekeeper/nanny for the Hadley household and was really good friends with Sephy’s mum but one day out of the blue she was fired and ever since theMcGregors have been having money problems.

There are many characters in this book; there is the Hadley’s (Sephy’s Family) which consists of Kamal Hadley (Dad), Jasmine Hadley (Mum) and Minerva Hadley (Sister).  There is also the McGregor’s (Callum’s Family) which consists of Ryan McGregor (Dad), Meggie McGregor (Mum), Jude McGregor (Older brother) and Lynette McGregor (Older Sister).

The McGregor’s are probably closer to each other than the Hadley’s because Kamal is divorcing Jasmine and marrying his girlfriend, Grace. Also like all sibling Sephy and Minerva and Callum, Lynette and Jude don’t get along. There are times in the book were Minerva is a perfect older sister and Sephy a perfect younger one like when Sephy is leaving for Chiver’s.

Callum and Lynette are very close, they understand and care for each other but Jude on the other hand is extremely heartless and cares for no one but himself. He calls Lynette ….

‘She’s a ruddy Nutter’ (pg 17) and   he also calls her

‘Stupid cow’ (pg 18)

And he calls Callum….

‘And Callum’s no better- Lord of the Ruddy Manor’ (pg 17)

The book has a very obvious class system, there are the Crosses who have everything-good schools, great jobs, big houses, shopping malls, servants (usually noughts), money always on hand in an emergency and all the power, whereas noughts on the other hand have very little- a few poorly facilitated schools, small houses, huge families, bad jobs, little pay and very little say in the economy.

In the beginning of the book, they are both extremely happy because they have just kissed and proved their love for one another. Callum is overjoyed because she allowed him to kiss her and Sephy is extremely happy because Callum kissed her and because He’s going to go to school with her at Heathcroft.

At this point in the book, Sephy is very naive and believes that everything’s going to be okay, and she’ll show him around and introduce him to her friends and they’ll all love him. But Callum is aware of the problems there going to face, like how he’ll be treated and if they spend time with together at the school she might lose all her friends because usually Noughts and Crosses don’t even talk to each other politely let alone be friends. But Sephy refuses to believe this and in her mind establishes as rubbish.

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‘Maybe it’d be better if we didn’t talk to each other when were at school’ (pg 15)

‘I don’t want you to lose any of your friends because of me’ (pg 15)

Then, when they arrive at school and there is the huge crowd of people saying

‘NO BLANKERS IN OUR SCHOOL! NO BLANKERS IN OUR SCHOOL! NO BLANKERS IN OUR SCHOOL!’ (pg 20)

At this point in the book Sephy, realizes that Callum was right about what’s going to happen, this is sort of the turning point for her where she slowly starts to understand the problems that are ...

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