English 305, Critical Analysis

February 15,2006

A Slice of Life

Hatchet (1997), by Gary Paulsen, is an epic tale of survival about thirteen-year-

old Brian Robeson, who survives his parent's divorce, a plane crash and months alone in

the Canadian wilderness. Paulsen serves up a slice of life and lets the story speak of the

human condition as Brian struggles with issues we all face: conflict, control, failure, fear,

solTow, hope, success, happiness and resolution. Maybe every survival story is just the

same story told over and over again. The author allows us to observe and eavesdrop on

Brian's thoughts as he fights to survive the trauma of the divorce, the challenges of

isolation, and the unpredictable elements ofnature.

While I read Hatchet. I wondered why the author chose to have Brian be a child

of divorce who was firlfilling a visitation requirement with his father. Why wasn't Brian

traveling on vacation to play soccer in Canad4 or something a kid would think of to do?

Why did the author tell us about the divorce and the Secret if we donot need to pay

attention to it? By observing the not so obvious the reader may discover What lies

between the lines. The pleasure we get from reading literature doesn't always lie in the

story itself but also in the discovery of ourselves and the human condition within the

story. Through disaster we come to know Brian as he discovers that the most important

rule for survival, and in all of life, is not to feel sorry for himself.

Sometimes life slices offmore than we think we can chew, and Gary Paulsen

shows us that things can always be worse. When the pilot of the small bush plane Brian is

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traveling in suffers a heart attack and dies, tirne stops for Brian. Paulsen provides a

flashback and we discover that time stood still for Brian before, when he learned the

Secret: "He had been riding his ten-speed with his friend Terry . . . and had decided to

[go home] a different way'' (31). Brian sees his mother in a car with a blonde haired man,

who is not Brian's father. She'oleaned across and kissed [the man], . - . it,was not a

friendly peck, but a kiss . . . mouth. . . against naouth of the blonde man who was not his

father" (68). Brian saw it and remembered every detail, ". . . Terry smiling, . . . the time

and temperature clock, the frogt wheel of his bike, . . . the hot hate slices of the memory

were exact- Q2). Alone in the wilderness, Brian struggles to divorce himself from the

memory of the Secret and assess the situation in the plane. The pilot isnot conscious and

"somehow the plane [is] still flyrng" (13). He must think quickly, for his reaction to his

circumstances will decide if he will survive or not, there is no time to feel sorry for

himself.

As Brian struggles to understand what has happened, he has to think to fly the

plane. Brian tries to think ahead, but there is so much uncerfainty about his situation, and

he does not know how to fly a plane. He unwillingly takes control of the plane and, in

doing so, is forced to take control of his life. It is the creative thought process and

experience of life, not physical growth, which nourishes and makes a man. Brian has to

choose which slice of lifs to take a bite from as Paulsen serves him a bitter reality. The

textbook Human Developm,ent (1998), by Diane Papalia and Sally Olds, informs us that

like birth ". . . divorce is a wrenching experience" [but] the resilience of the hurnan spirit

allows many children to come through it with [survival] skills that serve them well later

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in life" (307). Forced to face dramatic situations Brian gains experience quickly. Brian is

a boy when he enters the plane, but his time of metamoqphous to manhood is beginning.

Although he is overwhelmed with inexperience, Brian rejects defeat and calls for

help repeatedly over the radio. He realizes that the plane will run out of gas. Like the

secrel this is reality. Alone and helpless, Brian realizes that there are no lawyers, or

judges, or parents deciding how his life will go, just Brian, and Brian chooses to take

confiol. Paulsen tells us that Brian could see the picture in his mind that he had run it

over and over o'. . . how it would go. . . He tried to visualize it. He tried to be ready'' (24).

This reference is speaking about the impending crash of the plane, but the perspective is

similar to the view of an impending divorce: 'TrIo maffer how unhappy a marriage has

beeno its brcakup usually comes as a shock to a child'? (Papalia 307). The wrenching

shock of divorce may hurt so badly it feels hopeless, like dying. Paulsen seems to put us

on the plane with Brian as he gives him hope by showing him an opening in a channel of

fallen trees that provide an opening to a lake, and time stands still again for Brian as the

plane wrenches itself from the sky.

Those last three or four hundred feet from the ground are filled with incredible

sensory detail for Brian. He seems to lose altitude as quick as the shuffle of a deck of

cards. Adrenaline surges through his whole being as if to say humans are not intended to

feel like this. Like divorce, every obstacle is magnified and pulls his attention like a

magnate. Brian is sure he will hit the trees and die, but again he is able to take confrol of

his life and putl the nose up on the plane just before it slams into the lake then:

0.. . . Someone screamed tight animal screarns of fear and pain and he did not know it was

kis sound" (29). The plane plunges into the lake and is sinking but Brian fights his way

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through the water as if struggling to be bom. With life threatening effort he pulls without

knowing and pulls himself to the surface and into the light, pulling and screaming and

spiraling into nothing. Divorce can make aperson cry tight animal screams of fear and

pain while struggling, without knowing, wanting to spiral into nothing so he/she doesn't

have to feel anything because, as Barbara Cyr informs in her on-line essay, Divorce and

itsEffeptsonChildren,the:"... init ialstageof[divorce]... isthemostpainfirl"(01.)

Divorce puts Brian on the plane, but Paulsen shows us that although divorce is painfirl it

doesn't kill Brian and neither does the plane crash. Brian survives the plane crash and he

survives the divorce. Sometimes life slices the deck and deals a whole new game.

Gary Paulsen amplifies Brianos painfirl discovery of the secret with the agonzing

effort it takes to survive the plane crash. In the Educated Imagination, Northrop Frye

discusses literary cycles and we see that Brian "- . - goes from childhcod to death and

back again in a new birth" (50). While he lays injured and unconscious on the shore of

the lake, the memory comes ". . . like a knife cutting into him. Slicing him deep with

hate. The Secret-"(Paulsen, 31). A11 the details that haunt him rise to the surface of his

memory and he wakes up screaming and in pain with the memory. He realizes the crash

is over and that he is alive. Rebecca Lukens reminds us in A Critical Handbook of

Chil4ren's Literature (1999) of the fact that: "we all live with the choiees we makeoo

{146). This fact is literally true for Brian. Because of the choices he makes, Brian will

live. Paulsen tells us that on the way to the airport Brian's mother gives him a gift" a

hatchet to use in the woods with his father. Brian makes an effort to humor his mother

and buckles the hatchet securelv onto his belt. Because of this choice- Brian will live.

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Alienated from his secure world by the divorce and the plane crasho Brian learns

to use the hatchet and his imagination to slice &e wilderness into manageable pieces and

create a world he can live in. This gives him hope and a reason to awaken each day. Like

Brian's plight in the wildernEss, kids feel lost and alone in the midst of a divorce. They

aren't sure where they will live, or who will take care ofthem and can be overlooked

while their parents search for their own lives. At some point we are all faced, like Brian,

with the feeling of being alone in the world. An important nrle for survival, in all of life,

is to remember that our attitude can make all the difference irt the outcome of our

experiences.

Although Brian is alone in the wilderness Paulsen uses Brian's everyday slices of

information from school, television and memories to feed Brian as he learns how to

survive his life by trial and error and perseverance. According to the Dell Purse Book of

Names (1969) Brian's name means strong and powerful (37). We see his strength and

power grow from each experience life dishes out. Survival is not a single event but a

process with an indefinite beginning and ending, a sequence of potentially stressful

experiences that hinge precariously on the choices we make. Rather than divorcing

himself from his situation Paulsen has Brian marry his thinking to the nature of the

wilderness, as well as human nature, by understanding thail ". . . discoveries happened

because they needed to happen" {ltz). Brian discovers as Confucius says in Th,e

Wisdom of Confucius (1938):

When one is upset by anger, . . . [or] disturbed by fear; . . . when one is blinded by

love. . . [or] involved in worries and anxieties, then the heart is not in its right

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place (or the mind has lost its balance). When the mind isn't there, we look but do

not see, listen but do not hear and eat but do not know the flavor offood (144).

Brian leams to put his heart in the right place and learns to look and see, listen and hear,

and eat and know the flavor of food. Survival is an overwhehning challenge for Brian at

first, but as Brian gains his balance he grows stronger when he discovers that the secret

for survival is to not feel sorry for himself. I can imagine that Brian cries out: Why

doesn't somebody help me! Then he realizes that he is Somebody.

Gary Paulsen allows Bnan to affect his or,r,n metamorphous through survival in

the wildemess in such a realistic account of success and failure, discouragement and hope

that he makes Brian real for the reader. Brian is discouraged often throughout the story,

but with the help of the hatchet finds hope, courage, wisdom and security in his self-

awareness and newfound confidence. His world as he sees it is a world of His own

making. Secure in His world he survives for fifty-four days in the wilderness before he is

discovered and "rescued". When the rescue pilot finds Brian he says to him: "You're him

arenot you? You're that kid'(191). The pilot is wrong. He doesn't know Brian like the

reader does. He hasn't seen how Brian has changed. Brian is not that same kid who got

on the plane fifty-four days ago. He is not that same kid who discovered the Secret.

Brian's experiences have nourished him and made him into anew, strong and powerful

Brian. He will never be that old Brian again. Gary Paulsen reminds us that things can

always be worse and how we react can make all the difTerence in our world.

Works Cit€d

Confircius. Ihe ]tlisdom of Confrrqiuq. Ed. Lin Yutang. New York Random House, Tk

Modtrn Library, 1938,

Cyr, Bartara *Divore and its Effects m Childreu" Asrtrica Odine. 03 March 2001.

Available : www.women. com/relationships/divoice.htrnl.

Frye, Horthrap. The E4uetd Itragieation Bloomington Indirnq: Indiana University

Press,1964.

Lrrkens, Rebecca J. A Critical.Handbqok o4Chil&eg's Lit€rpture. 6e ed. New Yort:

Addison-Wesley Educational Publishers Inc., 1999.

Natn€$ Fqr B"ab.y. 3500. New York Dell Purse Book. DeU Publishhg Co. I:nc., 1969.

PrytiqDiane E., Sally lVendkos Olds, Rufib hrskirFeldman. Fhm+ Develof*nt.

?ft d. Boston Massa€husetts: McCrraw Hill, 1998.

Paulsen, Gaq/. Harc,het.New York: The Tnrmpet CIub, 1988.