This world is full of problems. Some are not easy to solve but none are impossible. We have to solve them because that’s what we live for. There are only two types of people in this world: those who have given up and those who endured and succeeded. In the book “The Maze Runner” by James Dashner, these characters face so many problems. The maze imprisoned them. The Grievers threaten their lives every time they set foot in the maze. Dashner uses the Gladers to symbolize people who are persistent problem solvers.
In the beginning of the book, the Gladers thought that the maze was impossible to solve. The maze kept changing at night, it’s enormous and dangerous at night. They kept going in but no one ever found an exit before sunset. Dashner also put the Griever in the maze to make it harder than it had to be. The Grievers are terrifying mechanical beasts. Its “stung” give intense pain and extremely dangerous poison; if you don’t get the antidote and go through the Changing, you won’t make it. Every Gladers that face the Griever never even thought of standing up to it, they just give up hope when they see it. Until Chapter 21 when Thomas and Minho was stuck in the maze at night. They ran at first but then they tried to send it off the cliff and it worked. On top of that, when Thomas and Minho returned they told the council their story and Thomas came up with a plan. Forty people agreed with Thomas and came along. They fought with the Grievers and they won; however, they lost 20 people.The rest of them exited the maze. The author is trying to say that if you meet a small obstacle like the Griever, you stand up to it and if you still failed but you don’t stop trying, you will succeed in the end.
Furthermore, the author let the Gladers be “stung” by the Griever to demonstrate to the reader that no matter what hardship you endure in the time of solving the problem, it will pays off in the end. In the book, Dashner told the reader that every time the Gladers got “stung” by the Griever they get the serum and they go through The Changing and then they heal. When you get stuck with a problem you don’t keep going with the same way; you need to stop and change your strategy then try again. The Changing, in the story, let the character remember their past but also intense pain that have been left by the Griever. Thomas wanted to remember so he got himself stung on purpose and he went through the Changing then he came up with a plan that work successfully. In other word, the author is trying to tell you to endure hardship that is in front of you, it’s always pays off in the end. That’s why Dashner added The Changing to the healing process when getting stung by the Grievers.
However, some people might argue that the maze, rather than the Gladers, is the main symbol of the story and it symbolizes the whole problem that we face everyday of our lives. The maze kept changing which tell the reader that our problem are changing as well. There are Grievers in the maze that represent people who keep making the problem, or the maze in the story, harder. That certainly can be true; however, it doesn’t account for the way the story goes, it isn’t about the problem itself but about the people who solve it. The maze is created for the Gladers for an experiment by W.I.C.K.E.D(a group of scientist that work together to study the Gladers’ brain and how they react to problems that seem unsolvable and study the brain wave so they can find a cure to the disease). It is about finding people who is truly persistent that will solve the problem no matter how bad the situation is or how many people they lose. From the beginning throughout the end, the author talked about Gladers themselves: how they thrive to find the solution, how some of them being scared and give up and how they succeed in fighting back.
All in all, Dashner thought that we all need to solve the problems we faced and he encouraged us not to give up, stay calm and act accordingly to guarantee one hundred percent success. If you don’t get it the first time, you altered your approach and try again.
By Sewen
Showing posts with label The Maze Runner. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Maze Runner. Show all posts
May 21, 2015
Theme of The Maze Runner: Decision Making
In society there is constant change everyday. When a problem is solved, new ones arise. Ideally, we all should work to solve the problems and to make the world a better place and to do that the right decisions must be made. People, however, have interesting ways of making decisions and sometimes it’s really hard to know if you have made the right or wrong decision. The book “The Maze Runner" by James Dashner takes place in a dystopian world which is a maze that was created by an organization named W.I.C.K.E.D. (World In Catastrophe: Killzone Experiment Department) that used selected boys to study their brain functions to produce a cure for a disease called The Flare. This disease occurred in another dystopian world that Dashner had created. However, nobody really knows if this is the perfect solution for the problem, but they go with it, even though not everyone in the society agrees with it. So, one theory is sometimes you need to trust your instinct and ignore what your brain or society says in order to solve problems.
In this book, Minho, who is the leader of the runners and Alby who is the leader of the Glade were going to see the dead Griever (a mechanical beast that was part of the experiment). Minho had reported that Griever was dead, but then later turned out that the Griever was not dead and it “stung” Alby. They couldn’t travel really fast and reach the gate at seconds before sunset. They had to reach the gate before sunset, because it closed at sunset, when the Grievers would come out. Thomas was at the gate but didn’t know what to do but decided on his instinct that he would go out of the Glade and help the two. Later the gate closed right after Thomas had ran out. At that moment Minho was scolding him for how stupid he was instead of working on a plan. Minho was losing hope and still shaking when he told Thomas that they needed to separate so they would have a better chance of survival. However, Thomas didn’t do so, he trusted his instinct and tried to help Alby by tying him up on the trees where the Griever might not spot them. His plan succeeded. Later that night when Thomas reunited with Minho they figured out a trick to send the Griever off a cliff and Minho trusted his instinct this time because he saw Thomas did it and it worked, so he went on with it and succeeded.
Later in the book, after getting stung on purpose Thomas went through the changing and called a gathering. He remembered everything(everybody’s memory was removed when they were put into the maze) and he had a plan but that plan would take away many people’s lives but he trusted his instinct and told it to them anyway. Later the leader Newt agreed to it and took Thomas and 40 other people to the hole that lead to the exit. In the end, twenty of them were killed but the rest succeeded and exited the maze.
However, not everybody agreed with the W.I.C.K.E.D’s way of solving the Flare. W.I.C.K.E.D was responsible for putting pressure toward the children by putting them in the maze and even killing them. At the end of the book, a group of people that were tired of the W.I.C.K.E.D’s way, got into the lab and killed the crew and rescued the kids. W.I.C.K.E.D may have been harsh toward children but they were the only scientists that could have been able to solve the problem while the other group were just ordinary people with guns who used their instincts and thinking that by putting W.I.C.K.E.D to a stop the children would be alright, but if they couldn’t find the cure the people will suffer and so will the children. Certainly it could be said that if they use their rational mind they could have figured that out. While that is a good point the author clearly favor the use of instincts for decision making like the critical moments in the book when Thomas ran out into the maze to save Minho and Alby and actually found a piece of puzzle that lead to escaping the maze.
To conclude, in order to live happily, make the right decisions, and shape a better world, we need to give our instinct more voice, but we need to use our rational mind too. Everything exists for a reason and if we don’t trust our instincts it’s like not using part of ourselves and the same thing applies for our rational mind. You have it, you use it. However, consider doing what your instinct come up first.
By Sewen
In this book, Minho, who is the leader of the runners and Alby who is the leader of the Glade were going to see the dead Griever (a mechanical beast that was part of the experiment). Minho had reported that Griever was dead, but then later turned out that the Griever was not dead and it “stung” Alby. They couldn’t travel really fast and reach the gate at seconds before sunset. They had to reach the gate before sunset, because it closed at sunset, when the Grievers would come out. Thomas was at the gate but didn’t know what to do but decided on his instinct that he would go out of the Glade and help the two. Later the gate closed right after Thomas had ran out. At that moment Minho was scolding him for how stupid he was instead of working on a plan. Minho was losing hope and still shaking when he told Thomas that they needed to separate so they would have a better chance of survival. However, Thomas didn’t do so, he trusted his instinct and tried to help Alby by tying him up on the trees where the Griever might not spot them. His plan succeeded. Later that night when Thomas reunited with Minho they figured out a trick to send the Griever off a cliff and Minho trusted his instinct this time because he saw Thomas did it and it worked, so he went on with it and succeeded.
Later in the book, after getting stung on purpose Thomas went through the changing and called a gathering. He remembered everything(everybody’s memory was removed when they were put into the maze) and he had a plan but that plan would take away many people’s lives but he trusted his instinct and told it to them anyway. Later the leader Newt agreed to it and took Thomas and 40 other people to the hole that lead to the exit. In the end, twenty of them were killed but the rest succeeded and exited the maze.
However, not everybody agreed with the W.I.C.K.E.D’s way of solving the Flare. W.I.C.K.E.D was responsible for putting pressure toward the children by putting them in the maze and even killing them. At the end of the book, a group of people that were tired of the W.I.C.K.E.D’s way, got into the lab and killed the crew and rescued the kids. W.I.C.K.E.D may have been harsh toward children but they were the only scientists that could have been able to solve the problem while the other group were just ordinary people with guns who used their instincts and thinking that by putting W.I.C.K.E.D to a stop the children would be alright, but if they couldn’t find the cure the people will suffer and so will the children. Certainly it could be said that if they use their rational mind they could have figured that out. While that is a good point the author clearly favor the use of instincts for decision making like the critical moments in the book when Thomas ran out into the maze to save Minho and Alby and actually found a piece of puzzle that lead to escaping the maze.
To conclude, in order to live happily, make the right decisions, and shape a better world, we need to give our instinct more voice, but we need to use our rational mind too. Everything exists for a reason and if we don’t trust our instincts it’s like not using part of ourselves and the same thing applies for our rational mind. You have it, you use it. However, consider doing what your instinct come up first.
By Sewen
Divergent and The Maze Runner Comparative Essay: Decision Making~People and Instinct
Decisions have tremendous impact. One good decision can save your life; however, just one bad one can also destroy your life. It is made by everyone in their everyday life. How people are making decisions though are very interesting. It had attracted the attention of researchers, scientists, and mostly authors. Two authors, Veronica Roth (author of “Divergent”) and James Dashner (author of “The Maze Runner”), are both interested in the topic but have rather different perspective of the process of decisions making.
In the beginning of “The Maze Runner”, Dasher illustrated how people make decisions by their instinct. Thomas, the protagonist who lived in the dystopian world of the maze, instinctively ran outside the gate at sunset to help Minho and Alby from the danger that is outside even knowing that he too would be trapped outside in the maze and face the same danger. (The gate closes at sunset and at night in the maze there are the mechanical beast called “The Griever” that can”stung” you to death.) Even while being trapped in the maze, Thomas didn't panic because his instinct told him not to and he even saved Alby’s life by tying him to the ivy leaves on the wall of the maze. He himself also escaped the danger by instinctively working with his momentum and the Grievers’ momentum to escape them, if he just run without deciding to do anything because his rational mind told him that if he failed his own momentum he would tripped and then the Griever would kill him, he would've been killed.
On the other hand, in “Divergent”, Roth demonstrated that different people make different decisions. She is doing that by categorising the people in the city. The Erudite make decisions based on logic, consequences and the big picture. The Candor make decisions based on the truth and only the truth. The Amity considered kindness, forgiveness, the truth and most of all peace before making a decision. The Dauntless make decisions based on justice, benefit, and reward, even it’s risky they'll take it. The Abnegation don’t think about themselves while making a decision, they think about other people and if the decisions that they are making will benefit people as a whole. The aptitude test also tells the reader that what you are define what you’ll do during the test. In the attack dog part of the test, Amity will pick chess as their weapon because they don’t believe in fighting with the dog, Dauntless will pick the knife because they want to take the risk and will fight for it if it’s justice; however, the Erudite won’t chose because they are curious about why do they need to choose one of the object and when the dog came they would lie down because they know the characteristic of the dog. Also when the dog attack the little girl Dauntless and Abnegation would sacrifice themselves and jump in front of her to save her while other factions would just stand there. One more part of the aptitude test is the bus. There is a man in the bus asking the tester if they know the wanted man that would kill the man on the bus, the tester will feel like they know the man in the picture. The Candor will tell the truth in that situation no matter what and the Abnegation would tell the truth too because that mean they can save the man’s life; however, other factions wouldn’t tell the truth.
Throughout the book “The Maze Runner”, Dashner uses third person narration to elaborate further that everybody trust their instinct. “He knew he should run into the Maze and help, but the rule about not leaving the Glade was seared into his mind.” (Excerpt From: James Dashner. “The Maze Runner.” iBooks.) This line worked very well because it clearly shown instinct is telling Thomas what to do if it’s in first person, it would be like “I should run into the Maze and help but the rule about not leaving the Glade is seared into my mind. However, in “Divergent” Roth uses first person narration because it signified that people are different and so are the decisions they are making. “I am not Abnegation. I am not Dauntless. I am Divergent.”(Excerpt From: Veronica Roth. “Divergent.” iBooks.) this moment of realization clearly had done the job well because If she uses third person narration, it would be: She is not Abnegation. She is not Dauntless. She is Divergent. It wouldn’t have sound as strong as the first person narration.
Some people might argue that in “The Maze Runner” Dashner want to illustrate how people act on their rational instead of instinct because at the end of the book Dashner demonstrated how a group of people act on their instinct and produce disastrous result and if they had just use their rational mind they would’ve figured out that they are not scientist and they can’t solve the problem and they can’t restore the world condition. However, their instinct may also told them that if they rescue the kids they can just let the kids live on with their life and there will be a generation with the immunity to the disease; therefore, solve the problem instead of putting the kids live in danger and watching how they react every seconds. In “Divergent” some people might also argue that people in “Divergent” make those decisions not because they are different type of people, they make those decisions because they are under peer pressure. For instance, when each family want their child to choose the same faction as theirs because they want their child to stay with them and when Caleb told Beatrice “We should think of our family.” “But. But we must also think of ourselves.”(Excerpt From: Veronica Roth. “Divergent.” iBooks.) Maybe Beatrice pick Dauntless because those words that Caleb said push her not to take Abnegation. However, this line “My mother told me to save them. Because of that, and because I am Dauntless”(Excerpt From: Veronica Roth. “Divergent.” iBooks.) clearly stated that she picked Dauntless because she is Dauntless not because of Caleb’s word or anybody’s.
In life, decision is an important aspect. Choosing your job, your school subjects… just because people around you or your friends pick History doesn’t mean you have to pick History. Everybody is different, you make your own decisions, they make theirs. Don’t fall to the peer pressure, be like Dauntless and fight it, be like Abnegation and help other around you to make decisions that they want to make, be like Amity and forgive your friends and be kind to them, be like Candor and never lie to your friends, and most of all be like Erudite, be smart and live your life but don’t ever forget about your instinct.
By Sewen
In the beginning of “The Maze Runner”, Dasher illustrated how people make decisions by their instinct. Thomas, the protagonist who lived in the dystopian world of the maze, instinctively ran outside the gate at sunset to help Minho and Alby from the danger that is outside even knowing that he too would be trapped outside in the maze and face the same danger. (The gate closes at sunset and at night in the maze there are the mechanical beast called “The Griever” that can”stung” you to death.) Even while being trapped in the maze, Thomas didn't panic because his instinct told him not to and he even saved Alby’s life by tying him to the ivy leaves on the wall of the maze. He himself also escaped the danger by instinctively working with his momentum and the Grievers’ momentum to escape them, if he just run without deciding to do anything because his rational mind told him that if he failed his own momentum he would tripped and then the Griever would kill him, he would've been killed.
On the other hand, in “Divergent”, Roth demonstrated that different people make different decisions. She is doing that by categorising the people in the city. The Erudite make decisions based on logic, consequences and the big picture. The Candor make decisions based on the truth and only the truth. The Amity considered kindness, forgiveness, the truth and most of all peace before making a decision. The Dauntless make decisions based on justice, benefit, and reward, even it’s risky they'll take it. The Abnegation don’t think about themselves while making a decision, they think about other people and if the decisions that they are making will benefit people as a whole. The aptitude test also tells the reader that what you are define what you’ll do during the test. In the attack dog part of the test, Amity will pick chess as their weapon because they don’t believe in fighting with the dog, Dauntless will pick the knife because they want to take the risk and will fight for it if it’s justice; however, the Erudite won’t chose because they are curious about why do they need to choose one of the object and when the dog came they would lie down because they know the characteristic of the dog. Also when the dog attack the little girl Dauntless and Abnegation would sacrifice themselves and jump in front of her to save her while other factions would just stand there. One more part of the aptitude test is the bus. There is a man in the bus asking the tester if they know the wanted man that would kill the man on the bus, the tester will feel like they know the man in the picture. The Candor will tell the truth in that situation no matter what and the Abnegation would tell the truth too because that mean they can save the man’s life; however, other factions wouldn’t tell the truth.
Throughout the book “The Maze Runner”, Dashner uses third person narration to elaborate further that everybody trust their instinct. “He knew he should run into the Maze and help, but the rule about not leaving the Glade was seared into his mind.” (Excerpt From: James Dashner. “The Maze Runner.” iBooks.) This line worked very well because it clearly shown instinct is telling Thomas what to do if it’s in first person, it would be like “I should run into the Maze and help but the rule about not leaving the Glade is seared into my mind. However, in “Divergent” Roth uses first person narration because it signified that people are different and so are the decisions they are making. “I am not Abnegation. I am not Dauntless. I am Divergent.”(Excerpt From: Veronica Roth. “Divergent.” iBooks.) this moment of realization clearly had done the job well because If she uses third person narration, it would be: She is not Abnegation. She is not Dauntless. She is Divergent. It wouldn’t have sound as strong as the first person narration.
Some people might argue that in “The Maze Runner” Dashner want to illustrate how people act on their rational instead of instinct because at the end of the book Dashner demonstrated how a group of people act on their instinct and produce disastrous result and if they had just use their rational mind they would’ve figured out that they are not scientist and they can’t solve the problem and they can’t restore the world condition. However, their instinct may also told them that if they rescue the kids they can just let the kids live on with their life and there will be a generation with the immunity to the disease; therefore, solve the problem instead of putting the kids live in danger and watching how they react every seconds. In “Divergent” some people might also argue that people in “Divergent” make those decisions not because they are different type of people, they make those decisions because they are under peer pressure. For instance, when each family want their child to choose the same faction as theirs because they want their child to stay with them and when Caleb told Beatrice “We should think of our family.” “But. But we must also think of ourselves.”(Excerpt From: Veronica Roth. “Divergent.” iBooks.) Maybe Beatrice pick Dauntless because those words that Caleb said push her not to take Abnegation. However, this line “My mother told me to save them. Because of that, and because I am Dauntless”(Excerpt From: Veronica Roth. “Divergent.” iBooks.) clearly stated that she picked Dauntless because she is Dauntless not because of Caleb’s word or anybody’s.
In life, decision is an important aspect. Choosing your job, your school subjects… just because people around you or your friends pick History doesn’t mean you have to pick History. Everybody is different, you make your own decisions, they make theirs. Don’t fall to the peer pressure, be like Dauntless and fight it, be like Abnegation and help other around you to make decisions that they want to make, be like Amity and forgive your friends and be kind to them, be like Candor and never lie to your friends, and most of all be like Erudite, be smart and live your life but don’t ever forget about your instinct.
By Sewen
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