Creative writing for The Chrysalids
Sophie’s parents
Mrs Wender
Mr Wender
Mrs Wender couldn’t believe how unlucky they had been. Her and her husband had prayed several times for this not to happen. This was not God’s image. This… Child which they dreaded to say was blaspheme! They thought to themselves about what it says in the bible as they said it aloud in unison. “And God created man in His own image. And God decreed that man should have one body, one head, two arms and two legs: that each arm should be jointed in two places and end in one hand: that each hand should have four fingers and one thumb: that each finger should bear a flat finger-nail….” They have to hide her away for several years, what’s best for her? Should we abort her? She seems so inoccent she said as she brushed her cheek with the back of her hand. Mr wender had just come up with an unusually imoral idea , but Mrs Wender dismissed that very quickly. Mrs Wender broke down howling quotes from the bible. Could it get any worse?
The next day she was lying blissfully in her bed whilst slowly stroking the baby’s smooth palm whilst singing ” round and round the garden like a teddy bear, one step, two step tickly under their” which she then tickled her excessively.
May 23rd, 2013 at 12:22 am
You begin to enter into Mrs Wender’s difficult thought process well. Do you think a mother could think of her child as a blasphemy? What sort of culture could bring families to abandon their malformed children? If you were to continue this (and it’s something i’d like to read) what might you tell us more about? Perhaps Sophie first realising that she was ‘different’, that must be a strange thought? Or maybe introduce us to Mr Wenders who always struck me as an interesting character? Either way, you begin nicely and I like how you move from a conventional response from the book “This was not God’s image” to something more personal and subtle.