Ignorance – the biggest evil
Developing the theme of poverty and Camus in details shows what disastrous effects it might have on people, especially on children. Lack of money in a family causes lack of education, and it is the biggest and the most awful thing that might results in lack of education – ignorance. As to Camus all the cruelties are results of ignorance. To show how it works Camus provides an image of children’s game. Jacques and other boys of his age created a game – it was to catch a cat into a box. The poor creature, when caught, made awful sounds of fear and when it finally managed to get out of the box, it run as quickly as it could. The boys meanwhile were being choked with laughing. These boys are not aware of how cruel their act is - and the author considers it a big tragedy, as “cruelty is born in ignorance”.
Hunting
Jacques remembers going hunting with his uncle Ernest, and it was a splendid time in his childhood, as both of his mother’s brothers were like fathers for Jacques; each of them had influenced Jacques in this or that way. Ernest was a more easy-going person and liked hunting. As they were in the forest during one of the hunting, Jacques remembers how he “helped rub down the horses and fasten around their necks the gray-brown canvas nose bags, in which the horses chomped their jaws, opening and closing their large brotherly eyes or chasing away a fly with an impatient hoof.” The image of horses, of wildness and of hunting helps the author to show connection of the main character with nature. Natural backgrounds play important role in the novel.
Jacques and Pierre
Jacques and Pierre are friends from childhood, and now they together are studying at the lyceum. Though two completely different individuals, they are both very clever and ingenious. Pierre is blonde, Jacques is dark-haired; Pierre is “even-tempered and steady”, while Jacques is “hot-tempered”. But both of them are brothers by “birth and fate”, both are “good students”. The image of contrast of both boys shows that it is only humanity inside that matters.
