LITERARY ESSAY

Literary Essay

Jose Guzman 805

Theme is a big part of books. Some themes are present and some are hidden. In the book Legend by Marie Lu Day is the main character. Day is a “rebel”. The government also known as the Republic hates him. Day is an athletic thief that has a grudge against the Republic. He was experimented on and has limp because of them. He steals and destroys thing from the Republic. After examining the actions that Day took against the government, and the people I have come to the conclusion that the theme of this book is person vs. society. The actions that Day takes in this book affect everyone positively and negatively.

The theme that is present inside Legend is person vs. Society. Day’s actions affect the government greatly. For example Day likes to mess with the Republic. Day steals supplies from the Republic. Day is known as the number 1 most dangerous criminal. No one knows who Day is or how he looks like. He makes the Republic look bad. They are focusing half of there energy on finding Day. Day’s destruction upon Republic’s ships affect the war they are fighting. “There’s my criminal report. It lights up the Jumbotron like always.” This sentence proves that The Republic is desperate to find Day. In our world policemen usually show the picture on T.V and hand out fliers. They don’t frequently post the criminal’s picture on a huge Jumbotron. He drives the Republic so crazy that when they do find him they kill his mother and take his older and younger brother. “The captain lifts his gun and points it at my mother. Then he shoots her in the head.” This proves that Day’s destructions and thievery has systematically corrupted the minds of the Republic. In order for you to kill an innocent human being you must be cold hearted. Which is what Day drove the republic to be.

The theme person vs. society is relevant because Day’s affects the innocent people. Although Day isn’t trying to cause harm to people he still does by his actions. For example there are more patrols going into the slug sector. The slug sectors are where the normal people live who didn’t score high enough on the examination to get into a rich house but didn’t fail. These people are all innocent. The Republic of course thinks that one of them is Day. They think that because no one knows who he is, and the best bet is a “slug”. Now these people have to worry about every single action they make. “I’m afraid that’s as long as I can keep you. The patrol is going to do another sweep soon.” This means that these people are being checked upon every few days for weird behavior and to see if anyone is hiding Day.  All of these examples show how Day’s actions affected society in a negative way.

Although Day’s actions had negative affects some were positive. For example Day gives the citizens hope. They finally have someone to believe in. Actions against the community are what the theme person vs. society is all about. At the end of the book Day is going to be executed publicly.  “ A group of protesters that was fairly large have streaked their hair scarlet to symbolize Day.” The punishment for these followers was death. These people felt that Day could lead them into a new era that they were willing to die. These people were so filled with hope. They truly felt inside that Day was changing the future. Also Day positively affected the Patriots. At the end of the book he joins the Patriots which is a group fighting a war against the Republic. He becomes a nice asset to have.

All in all, the theme that is shown in the book is person vs. society. In order for the theme to be person vs. society there has to be issues that affects the community. Day has caused issues that affected the community positively and negatively. The issues that came up from the day ultimately affected the community. Overall Day is a huge impact in society.