One of the most popular tasks for a modern student in the literature field is writing an essay, review or thesis. There is a huge amount of various interesting topics for this assignment. Thus, we present a good example of leadership essay about a well-known book in the world of science fiction “Ender`s Game.”
Orson Scott Card is one of the most prominent names in modern science fiction. He is an American science fiction writer. His cycle of novels about Ender is one of the most striking examples of present fiction.
At the first blush, the storyline is sadly ordinary. In the introduction it is said that the action takes place in the future: 2135.
The mankind slowly developed space and scientific technologies, changed the political map, suffered from an excess of population, revealed the possibilities of a worldwide computer network. But one terrible day, the Earth was not lucky to be in the path of the scouts of a different civilization – “the buggers,” whose ancestors hundreds of millions of years ago probably built anthills under the pines and suffered from the invasion of local wildlife lovers. The two races could not come to an agreement, and a war broke out, called the First Invasion, in which mankind managed to win with difficulty and not without luck. The Second Invasion people also managed to repel, but time passes, and earthlings live in fear of a possible Third Invasion.
The future of our planet Earth
Waiting for the inevitable third war, the International Space Fleet staff organized a battle school for super-gifted children. The training model is aimed at searching among students of a potential commander in chief who would have the strategic talents like Napoleon and Alexander the Great. Ender Wiggin was one of those who entered this school. Unfortunately, he was too quick-witted and became an ideal candidate for the role of the future savior of the Earth.
Ender’s Game is a book about inescapable loneliness. Ender Wiggin is a boy, special in everything from the very beginning of his existence. Even his birth was sanctioned by the government because Ender is the one who must save humanity from the invasion of ruthless alien creatures. And he knows about it. A boy from his earliest years shows very outstanding abilities. It seems that this is enough to become a renegade. But adults think otherwise. Teachers want to isolate the hope of mankind from their peers so that the boy will understand how to find a way out of difficult situations. The literary analysis shows that this hides a good literary move: from the first paragraph Card puts Ender in the position of the victim, that prompts the reader to empathize with the hero and with him rejoice in victories, successes, and achievements.
How people should behave in order to save the planet
The school of great space commanders is the power and the most interesting line of the novel, but the future of 2135 is somewhat scary. The birth of children is put under strict control; the third child is considered an unaffordable luxury. As can be seen from the history of Ender’s parents, resistance to order somewhere else was present at the level of religious organizations of Mormons and Catholics. The mother and father of the main hero broke with their environment, their conformism towards the system completely broke the parent will. They do not resist the implantation of a computer into the brain of their child; they allow them to take their son to participate in dubious and unsafe experiments.
Orson Card and his point of view
The time of writing the novel affected the political preferences of Orson Card. He so persuasive fears such a hostile structure as the Warsaw Pact that he even made Ender’s father ashamed of his Polish origin, and presented the country as a pariah of the international community.
The heroes of the novel are recognizable. Everything is like in life: there are those who envy others’ successes, those who are used to achieving goals by force, not by their mind, and those who are ready to recognize the superiority of another in any field. Realistic characters combined with the realism of the world. This is achieved by the fact that the writer skillfully uses the manipulation of smoothly introducing a character into an unfamiliar system both for him and for the reader – in this case, then it is the battle school.
Beginning with the title “Ender Game” as an almost childlike, adventure space fantasy about an alien invasion, the cycle is becoming more serious and deep from novel to novel. The deeper analysis demonstrates that this is philosophical, social, psychological and, what is especially interesting, religious, “openly” theological prose. The main topic is contacted with others, in particular, the religious side of contact (another race adopts Christianity, despite the opposition of some clerics; theological problems around it, etc.). Other themes include issues of peace and violence (the cycle begins with the destruction of an entire race, and the main question is whether another race will survive), death, love and family, sin, responsibility for the sin, thirst for redemption and so on.
In conclusion, the skillful game on the emotions of the reader, realistic characters, truly original plot twists, correctly found trends in the development of civilization, successful fantastic assumptions – all this makes “Ender’s Game” one of the best science fiction novels of the last twenty years.
