Mason Pocklington

Night Circus is an interesting novel about love, choice and magic. A big theme of this book was forbidden love. As mentioned in the briefing, this type of fantasy is meant to help teens learn the world around them, so the idea of forbidden love applies here. As the apprentices were meant to duel, with only one surviving, the idea of making love over war is a theme that applies in our real world as well. Also, the circus itself is important. Where on surface level it might seem like a good thing, the characters quickly realize that it has a much darker undertone. Keeping with the idea that this novel is supposed to help teens in real life, you can see that what you could take from this novel is to not trust things on their surface value. Similarly, how each of their respective mentors is controlling, which brings the idea of teens rebelling against both authority and what they're told. Another thing that backs this argument up is that how the mentors are more focused on besting the

For this week I chose to talk about both the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. I've read both and watched both movies, and they're great, classic tales of a heroic journey. In Lord of the Rings, an important factor that differs from the Hobbit is the value of corruption. Frodo, throughout the course of the novel, grows increasingly attached to the ring that he comes across. The audience sees and predicts the outcome of this greed, but the other members of Frodo's party are blind to it. This is why it comes as a surprise to Sam, when Frodo decides not to cast the ring into the fire. The tale of a heroic journey is classified by many things that are present in both the Hobbit and LoTR. Taking the main protagonist out of their home or comfortable environment is key - this helps the average audience member relate to and feel the same way as the main character does. Another key point is having a "party", or fellowship in LoTR, a group of friends that accompany the main