Character Analysis of The Red Convertible

Character Analysis Henry Junior is a character in the story "The Red Convertible. " Written by Louis Erdrich. In this story he has a younger brother who narrates the story and undergoes a big change. Henry is introduced in the story as a good big brother who works hard for his money and helps support his family. In the opening of the story the narrator depicts henry as a well-rounded, good individual who cares for his family as well as others. Henry and his brother gather their money together and go buy a red convertible.

This is when we begin to see that Henry is a good brother as well as a hard worker. In the beginning of the story the youngest brother works his way up in the business world starting as a minimum wage worker then continuing on to own a restaurant. This shows the dedication and hard work he has and how he works hard for what he gets and takes care of the things he owns.

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As he continues in his story he goes back to when his restaurant was destroyed in a terrible accident. After this is when the boys find something they truly love. When the boys buy a car it is everything they could have imagined and more.

They drive everywhere together; they take road trips as well as work on the car and take are of it. This shows how much this one thing bonds these brothers together, and how that this one thing changed their relationship and the way they could live there lives.

The story begins to change when Henry is called to serve the army in the draft and the boys begin to grow older. The narrator shows some concern about his brother going to the army but is not to worried. He was lucky enough not to get his name drawn and is somewhat relieved about this but is still not happy about his brother.

Henry goes off to training and Lyman then takes full responsibility of helping out his amily as well as taking care of the red convertible. This shows how henry continues to be responsible and help support the ones he loves. Although he misses henry a lot he writes him as often as possible but can only hope and pray for a letter in return. It had been almost three years since Henry returned home from the war. The war was over but the effects were still very clear. As Henry comes back into life in the real world his brother notices that he is very different. His brother Henry was not the same person at all.

The war had changed him, and not for the better. Henry was very umpy and seemed to be weird about everything, hardly ever cracking a smile or laughing at anything. This was caused by the war and what Henry had seen, he had been devastated. On top of this his family is worried too because it is not the same person they knew before he went to war. While Henry was at war Lyman had takin excellent care of there prized possession. symbol of there love to each other as well as there friendship. Once Henry returned he barely even looked at the car and did not seem to care.

Once again this was a result of the war. This was devastating to Lyman and he could not fgure out what as wrong and could only fgure one way to make his brother back to his normal self. Lyman did the unthinkable, he went out to the two brothers prized possession and begins to damage it on purpose. He does this in order to get his brother interested in something again to get his mind off what he had been in the past three years. This indeed worked, but his brother Henry was very upset about this. This shows that no matter how much the war changed , he still cared. Henry worked constantly on the car.

This shows he still had all the good memories and thoughts of the car, he was till the same old Henry he Just needed to be shown. After all of this the boys take the car to the river and laugh and have a good time playing and having good times like back before the war. Henry Jumps in the river but does not know how to swim. He drowns and his brother goes in after him but does not find him. He puts the car in gear and drives it into the river. This shows Lyman letting go of the past and his brother knowing he will not get it back. He does this to rid himself of the guilt and pain. This represents how life can be up, and down happy, and sad.