Atonement - Post #4

“Exhaustion made him vulnerable to the thoughts he wanted least. He was thinking about the French boy asleep in his bed, and about the indifference with which men could lob shells into a landscape. Or empty their bomb bays over a sleeping cottage by a railway, without knowing or caring who was there. It was an industrial process. He had seen their own RA units at work, tightly knit groups, working all hours, proud of the speed with which they could set up a line, and proud of their discipline, drills, training, teamwork. They need never see the end result—a vanished boy” (McEwan, 224).

This passage is all about Robbie. Obviously the content doesn't directly describe him, rather it is focused on the horrible scenes of war and how soldiers often have to desensitize themselves inn order to stay sane in times of war. But the paragraph does still give us some valuable insight into Robbie's character, what his true values are and what kind of person he is deep down. While many of his comrades in war are able to complete their duties without worrying about the "end result," Robbie is haunted by not only his own actions, but those of others as well, simply seeing some of the atrocities of war which he has been through have scarred him, leaving him unable to sleep at night. This passage, as well as this general period in the novel makes me like Robbie a lot more than I already did, as well as making me dislike Briony more than I already did. Not to say that I loved Robbie and hated Briony up until this point, but Robbie rarely did anything wrong in the novel, at least never morally wrong, he never knowingly set out to hurt others. And while Briony certainly didn't knowingly intend to hurt Robbie, her ignorance and naiveté resulted in his entire life essentially being ruined. Robbie is a character with a big heart, he cares about those he hasn't ever met simply because they are people just like him and we, as the reader, see that when he goes off to war, and it is exemplified perfectly in this passage.