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You’ll have no doubt heard about the latest dystopian YA novels following the success of The Hunger Games. One of these is called Divergent, a book about the life of a sixteen year-old girl called Beatrice. There are other places you can read the blurb, so I won’t expand too much.
WARNING! CONTAINS SPOILERS!!
Beatrice – the protagonist – is a member born into the Abnegation faction, representing selflessness. She can choose from a variety of others: Amity (peaceful), Erudite (knowledge), Candor (truthful) and Dauntless (brave). It’s rather obvious throughout the beginning of the book that she would go on to choose the Dauntless faction – and she does.
The thing that reminds me most of Hogwarts, however, is not the quality-type choosing. Of course, one could liken Dauntless to Gryffindor and Erudite to Ravenclaw, but that’s rather obvious.
Erudite – the faction for knowledge, supposedly – displays very Slytherin-like qualities after some time. However, one could argue that they are actually just Ravenclaw traits. Arrogance would be evident in a person who holds the knowledge, for isn’t knowledge power? Dauntless is obviously Gryffindor, the meaning of the very faction being brave. However, what is the difference between bravery and stupidity? I think that’s the line crossed between the members of the Dauntless faction and members of Gryffindor house. While Harry could have acted in better ways on some occasions, he doesn’t do stupid things that could endanger his life for nothing – for the intention of proving he is brave. He did that by getting sorted into Gryffindor.
However, the Hogwarts-esque theme in this book is the Divergent that Beatrice is – it’s rather obviously Hufflepuff. Throughout the book, Four tells her how Abengation and Dauntless – selflessness and bravery – are not so different. Hufflepuff is a house of ‘nice’ people, sometimes referred to as duffers. However, this doesn’t mean they would be completely selfless. I also think they would be brave. If they were truly nice they would risk their lives for the wellbeing of others.
In my opinion, Hufflepuff and Divergent are very similar. Divergent could also be similar to Gryffindor, but I think Hufflepuff portrays the selfless quality that promotes a person to be brave more.
After all, bravery isn’t the absence of fear. The message I see in this book is that being brave is standing up for what you believe on. On all the occaisons Beatrice is ‘brave’ in this book (truly brave) it is to help others.
Sorry if this article didn’t really make sense, it was just a view I wanted to share with you. What did you make of the factions, if you have read it and where would you want to go?
I think Divergent would be the obvious answer. Simply because – I think – we could all be considered Divergent.
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