Criminals in Atonement Flashcards
Briony is a child (6)
‘poor darling Briony, the softest little thing’ p 65
‘If only she, Briony, had been less innocent, less stupid’ p168
‘her fundamental lack of grasp of the situation is nicely caught’ p312
‘We catch the young girl at the dawn of her selfhood’ p312
‘If this girl has so fully misunderstood or been wholly baffled by the strange little scene that has unfolded before her, how might it affect the lives of the two adults? Might she come between them in some disastrous fashion?’ p313
Briony’s desire to name the crime (1)
‘seal the crime, frame it with the victim’s curse, close his fate with the magic of naming’ p165
Briony’s unreliability (1)
‘In the later years she regretted not being more factual, not providing herself with a store of raw material. It would have been useful to know what happened, what it looked like, who was there, what was said’ p280.
Briony’s need for control (5)
‘The play – for which Briony had designed the posters, programs and tickets, constructed the sales booth out of a folding screen tipped on its side, and lined the collection box in red crepe paper – was written by her in a two day tempest of composition’ p3
‘She was one of those children possessed by a desire to have the world just so’ p4
‘Briony’s [room] was a shrine to her controlling demon’ p5
‘Her straight-backed dolls appeared to be under strict instructions not to touch the walls… suggested by their even ranks and spacing a citizen’s army awaiting orders’ p5
‘A taste for the miniature was one aspect of an orderly spirit’ p5
Briony exaggerates her crime to the readers in order to satisfy her desire for punishment. She makes her criminality obvious. (5)
‘Within the half hour Briony would commit her crime’ p156
‘She would never undo the damage. She was unforgivable.’ P285
‘Did she think she could… drown her guilt in a stream – three streams – of consciousness?’ p320
‘She would never be able to console herself that she was pressured or bullied. She never was.’ P170
‘She trapped herself, she marched into the labyrinth of her own construction, and was too young, too awestruck, too keen to please, to insist on making her own way back’ p170
Robbie is presented as a typical criminal (9)
“I thought he was a monster” Lola p119
“something manic and glazed in his look” according to Briony p151
Briony thinks of Robbie as a “maniac” p166
“Mr Turner was a dangerous man” p181
“as though issuing a command that Cecilia dared not obey” p38
“what strange power did he have over her? Blackmail? Threats?” p38
“her forearm which was raised in protest, or in self-defence” p123
‘Something irreducibly human, or male, threatened the order of their household’ p114
‘She had interrupted an attack, a hand-to hand fight… he looked so huge and wild’ p123
Robbie becomes a criminal (3)
‘He felt hostile to everyone around him. His feelings had shrunk to the small hard point of his own survival’ p217
‘Turner grabbed the man by his tie and was ready to smack his stupid face with an open right hand’ p217
‘In the lucid freedom of his dream state, Turner intended to shoot the officer through the chest. It would be better for everybody’ p247
Lola is a child (3)
‘Poor vain and vulnerable Lola with the pearl-studded choker and the rose-water scent, who longed to throw off the last restraints of childhood…’ p324
‘Lola – barely more than a child, prised open and taken – to marry her rapist’ p324
‘Her hair was gathered into a single childish plait’ p324
Lola is presented as an adult (4)
‘In the guise of the adult she considered herself at heart to be’ p34
‘tokens of maturity’ p34
‘The girl was almost a young woman, poised and imperious, quite the little Pre-Raphaelite princess with her bangles and tresses, her painted nails and velvet choker’ p60
‘The older girl, always one step ahead of her’
Lola is presented negatively in part 1 (4)
‘Wasn’t there manipulation here, wasn’t Lola using the twins to express something on her behalf, something hostile or destructive?’ p13
‘Briony suspected that behind her older cousin’s perfect manners was a destructive intent’ p34
‘Lola had stolen Briony’s rightful role’ p37
‘How like Hermione Lola was, to remain guiltless while others destroyed themselves at her prompting’ p147
Lola is presented negatively in ‘London, 1999’ (1)
‘There was a touch of the stage villain here – the gaunt figure, the black coat, the lurid lips. A cigarette holder, a lapdog tucked under one arm and she could have been Cruella de Vil’ p358
Lola contributes to Briony’s criminality (3)
‘Lola.. was able to retreat behind an air of wounded confusion, and as a treasured patient, recovering victim, lost child, let herself be bathed in the concern and guilt of the adults in her life’ p168
‘She had little more to do than remain silent behind her cousin’s zeal. Lola did not need to lie, to look her supposed attacked in the eye and summon the courage to accuse her, because all that work was done for her, innocently… Lola was required only to remain silent about the truth, banish it, and forget about it entirely..’ p168
‘Lola’s weight on Briony’s shoulder’ p171
Negative presentation of Paul Marshall (5)
‘Marshall took control of the conversation with a ten minute monologue’ p49
‘Warmonger’ p50
‘How deliciously self-destructive it would be, almost erotic, to be married to a man so hugely rich, so unfathomably stupid. He would fill her with his big-faced children, al of them loud, bone-headed boys with a passion for guns and football and aeroplanes’ p50
‘Mr. Marshall had pubic hair growing from his ears’ p51
‘It was a cruel face’ p58
