Analysis of "Fiela's Child". Detailed Analysis of a Passage:Characterisation of Elias Van Rooyen

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Detailed Analysis of a Passage:

Characterisation of Elias Van Rooyen

By Eddie Royle

English Hl, Ms. Lacy

Word Count: 923

Everyone has tried at least once to hide his or her emotions. Elias Van Rooyen attempted to hide just this. However, he conceded to three stages of grief: denial, anger, and acceptance. Throughout the passage, Elias projects a fondness towards Lukas, shown through his shocked behaviour on Lukas’s departure.  

While Elias waits for Lukas’s arrival, he has an on going struggle with himself, whether or not Lukas will return. On the first day, Elias impatiently waits to see Lukas. The author, Dalene Matthee shows Elias’s increasingly worried grapple on where Lukas is. “If someone had told him Lukas would go like that, he would have told that person to his face that he was a liar”. The author did not even show Elias questioning where Lukas was, but instead had Elias starting to deny what might have happened, “Not Lukas… Not even a wretched dog just walked off like that”. By Elias denying to himself that Lukas might not be coming, the reader realises that Elias is worried. The imagery of “wretched dog” gives the bitter words Elias is feeling, perhaps because he is beginning to feel scared that Lukas will not come. Through the use of negative definition, the reader can see Elias’s worry and anger beginning to show, “Not Lukas, … believed it of Kristoffel even, but not Lukas”. The use of the word “not” implies that Elias is scared, but also foreshadows the truth, that Lukas will not return. In the beginning of the novel we see the same denial in Elias, when Lukas first disappears, “How often must I tell you that the child is not missing!” (Pg4). After this denial, Elias has to understand that Lukas left/walked off. So by seeing Elias’s denial the reader knows something is not right. Elias continues to question what might have happened.

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On the third day, Elias, still concerned, began searching for different alternatives to Lukas being missing. Elias explored all the different possibilities to what was keeping Lukas, “Perhaps he could not find Nina”. Elias was still trying to stay strong and optimistic, but was showing signs of vulnerability. By using the word “perhaps” he is trying to comfort himself, suggesting the good outcomes. The author uses parallel structure to further express Elias’s denial and growing worry, “Perhaps he had tried to take a shortcut and got lost, or perhaps the elephants had chased him”. Elias explores every possibility that is ...

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