So in A Long Walk to Water there are two main characters, boy and a girl. Just to recap from my last post, the boy's (Salva) story takes place from 1985 to 2009 and the girl's (Nya) story takes place from 2008 to 2009. The narrator switches off between telling the two stories.
While I was reading the book I noticed that the author, Linda Sue Park, describes how Salva leads a group in almost the exact same way twice, once in 1991-1992 during the telling of Salva's story, and once in 2009 during the telling of Nya's story.
*Slight Spoiler Alert*
Here is the quote from Salva's story. On page 81 it says "Salva would talk to them [the boys he was directing], encourage them, coax and persuade them. Once in a while he a to speak sternly, or even shout. But he tried not to do this so often." Then on pages 76-76 from Nya' s story it says "The boss would encourage the workers and laugh and joke with them. If that didn't work, he would talk to them earnestly and try to persuade them. And if that didn't work, he would get angry. He didn't get angry very often." We later learn that the boss is Salva.
Okay, so my question was there any point in the fact that there are many similarities in the way the author describes Salva. I think that there is a point. I think that it shows how mature Salva's experiences have made him, and how mature he already was in the first case. In the first case he has been without his family or anyone to help him for six years. That is a very long time to be away from your family, especially if you don't know if you will ever see them again. I don't think it is ever something someone would want.
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