What Is The Loss Of Innocence In The Round House

There is a large presence of power when Joe is introduced into the story. Joe has dominance over Eatonville as well as over Janie. What strived the control over Janie and the people of Eatonville was the desire of power. His power caused the townspeople to appreciate his effort of change in the town however, they also fear his strength.

The key theme of The Round House is pursuit of justice. Initially Joe wanted his father, Bazil, who works as a tribal judge on the reservation, to find and punish his mother’s perpetrator. He was actively trying to help his dad as much as possible by reading case files from his father’s previous cases, but over time however he realized, “All of the cases that my father judged were nearly as small, as ridiculous, as petty.” (Erdrich, 48) When he realizes that his father has never handled a case like this, he is enraged. This also motivates to take justice in his own hands and start his own small investigation at the Round House, “I had

On November 30th, Joe ran away from his master, Thomas Bowyer. Joe is about forty-six years old, and around the height of 5 ’10. When speaking to this man he has a very smooth, and soft voice. When drinking liquor he becomes a very religious man. Bowyer says that he can read print very well, is a great liar, and can deceive anyone that does not know him.

The coming of age of a person could be at the age of twelve, or twenty, or forty – it all depends on each person’s ability to reach a certain level of maturity – not necessarily meaning when one is independent, but rather when one seems sensible and reliable. In terms of maturity, humans have different levels of development some mature faster, while others develop quite gradually. Most of the time, the experiences that one goes through determines the speed of the rate of the maturity of that person because past experiences affect the way that we make decisions that benefit ourselves, and the people around us. Louise Erdrich’s The Round House is a coming-of-age story about Joe Coutts, a thirteen-year-old Native American, who is thrust into adulthood

Janie tells Joe “And now you got tuh die tuh find out dat you got tuh pacify somebody besides yo’self if you wants any love and any sympathy in dis world. You ain’t tried tuh pacify nobody but yo’self. Too busy listening tuh yo’ own big voice.” (Pg 87) Janie thinks very little of Joe.

Joe's incident in battle seemingly resulted in the termination of his communication skills, however later in the novel he discovered a single method of communication: tapping out morse code. He still fights mental battles with himself due to his ongoing guilt about his life before the bomb, but he has a method of communication. Charlie Anderson, like Joe, was forced to grapple with the ramifications of war, first through the death of his eldest son, and then through the murder of his other son and daughter in law. However, unlike Joe, Charlie had experienced loss as a secondhand effect of war. Charlie’s family had strived to avoid anything related to the war, including repeatedly refusing a Confederate officer’s plea to join the war.

(46). Joe believes that he is doing Janie a favor by providing her with the life he thinks she wants, and this causes her to feel isolated. Although she is still unsure of herself, she knows that her vague idea of the life she expects does not align with Joe’s vision. Despite their conflicting viewpoints, she chooses to suffer in silence because of her fear and reliance on Joe for financial security. Janie allows him to create an uneven power dynamic in which she becomes simply a part of Joe’s image for the public eye.

With that, Joe is left to find out who did this to his mother,

As discussed, Joe tried to get justice for his mother, but that wasn’t enough for him, not when there were others on the reservation who weren’t receiving any type of equity on the attacks against them, and so once again he took matters into his own hands, but this time he decided to do it the right way. Joe already had influence from his father since he was a lawyer as well, but the reader can easily assume that the main reason he decided to become a lawyer was because of his mothers attack. The idea of justice will forever be in the back of Joe’s head because of the events that occurred when he was just a boy, but even after everything thing that happened, he decided to make the most of

It’s been shown that Joe is very self-absorbent and only cares about his reputation. His superiority complex is what is ruining him and everything decent thing around him. Joe is constantly mixing around his values and turning them into something horrible. He is so worried about being perceived as a weak man that he puts all of that into making sure Janie is perfect, “But Jody was set on it. Her hair was NOT going to show in the store.

This attack changed Joe's family, but it also changed his mother. “She slowed and then stopped. She turned to my father, staring out of the covers as out of a cave. Her eyes were black, black in her grey face. She spoke in a low, harsh voice that grew large between my ears.

He had promised Janie a better life with the money he had saved up to move to a new town, Eatonville, that was run by people of color. Not only did Joe glamorize his dreams with her, Janie's hopes for love returned. However, her decision to run off with Joe had put her in a difficult situation especially after he became mayor of Eatonville. He was able to provide Janie with a comfortable life but became controlling and both mentally and physically abusive. He would speak out “without giving her a chance to say anything” (Hurston, 1937/2013, p.43) or he would go to the extent of hitting her or making her change the way she looked and acted to keep a status within their community.

Joe once thinks of selling his land to the Devine owning to the financial problems in raising his family. However, after much persuading by Ruby Archuleta and Charlie Bloom, a progressive lawyer who fights for the rights of the villagers, Joe decides to continue to work in his beanfield despite all the difficulties he has to endure. The Devine keeps on oppressing him by sending its minions to thwart Joe’s efforts to irrigate his beanfield. In one of the incidents, the Devine tries to accuse Joe for allowing his cow to graze the grass of the Federal Government, but fails miserably as Joe is advocated by the villagers who exculpate him from the acrimonious allegation. With the help of Charlie Bloom, Ruby and the villagers, Joe becomes the hero of the village, the leader who successfully suppress the evil land developer’s movement.

He is alone; he has no job opportunity in Washington because Roy has died. But Joe is happy. Joe has finally faced unlocked that “hidden thing” and he has embraced it. Joe’s secret exists no more, and he gains that confidence and sureness that he was missing. Although Joe loses everyone else, he finds himself.

In Chapter 12, Joe behaves abnormally after coming back from Miss Havisham’s place and receiving twenty-five pounds from her as Pip’s wage. However honest and artless Joe was before, he is for sure dramatically different after the trip to Miss Havisham’s, which makes me wonder what might possibly cause this extreme change to happen (my question). I first thought that since the author has portrayed the lady’s mansion as a ghostly and deserted place where Pip has even once saw a ghost, maybe it’s the place that has caused this change in Joe. In the book, Joe hypocritically flatters Mrs. Joe, who is angry by the fact that the lady invites Joe to the mansion and not her, by making up greetings to Mrs. Joe from the lady, who in fact may not