Exploring Compassion and Ruthlessness in 'Ender's Game

I've read through your eyes, I've thought what's in your mind and I tell them you are the one. Or at least as close as we are going to get. Orson Scott Card's: Ender's Game, is a bold and extraordinary novel about six-year-old boy, Andrew (Ender) Wiggins and his quarrels and emprises at Battle School. Throughout this novel, the author makes us feel the emotions of yearning compassion and the brutality of Ender's ruthlessness.

The author shows that Ender has compassion in his life and the reason why he plays the game so well, is his ability to understand and outsmart the enemy but to also spark loyalty and allegiance but, in the end, compassion saves him.

"Dink misunderstood the expression on Ender's face. 'Hey, I know, nobody's supposed to talk about home. But we came from somewhere. The Battle School doesn't create anything. It just destroys. And we all remember things from home. Maybe not good things, but we remember and then we lie and pretend that--- look, Ender, why is it that nobody talks about home, ever? Doesn't that tell you how important it is? That nobody even admits that?'" (Card 108).

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Dink is right about that message, we all have a backstory and Ender misses his home life with his parents, Valentine (his adoring older sister) and Peter (his oldest sibling and Ender often compares himself to Peter). More examples of compassion would be Valentine, she celebrated Ender's eighth birthday alone and in their new house in Greensboro.

The author, Orson Scott Card, states "She scraped a patch of ground bare of pine needles and leaves, and there scratched his name [Ender/Andrew] in the dirt with a twig. Then she made a small teepee of twigs and needles and lit a small fire. It made the smoke interwove with the branches and needles of the pine overhead. All the way to space, she said silently. All the way to Battle School." (Card 122). The text signifies that Valentine is longing for her brother to return because at this point of the novel Ender has been at Battle School for over two years and there has been no communication between Ender and his family, so it is understandable for Valentine to feel this way because before Ender leaves home she declared "Come back to me! I love you forever!" (Card 26). Valentine says this in an anguished cry as the car sped away, and through the book she promised to love him forever and she does want him to come back. The author makes it feel like the rest of the family has either forgotten about Ender or thinks that Ender is dead and never coming back but, Valentine is determined to keep Ender in her heart and to be ready for him coming home. Compassion can lead to joy and happiness or it could become something dangerous and ruthless.

Book and its characters can be, they can also be very ruthless and show weaknesses, for example Ender is constantly influenced by Peter. Either Ender himself compares the two of them or the I.F and teachers do. On page eight the author puts Ender in a fight with a young boy named Stilton, after Ender wins the fight he states "Ender leaned against the wall of the corridor and cried until the bus came. 'I am just like Peter. Take my monitor away and I'm just like Peter.'" (Card 8). Ender hates the feeling of being like Peter because Peter always claims he is going to kill Ender and his sister Valentine, making it look like an accident but thankfully these are just empty threats by the oldest child in the family.

Ender feels the same emotion when he is harassed by Bernard on the way to Battle School and in a result Ender breaks Bernard's arm and sends him messages through his desk making Bernard look like a fool. Because of these actions of ruthlessness, the author described Ender breaking Bernard's arm "Just as the next blow was coming, Ender reached up with both hands, snatched the boy by the wrist, and pulled down on the arm, hard· I am Peter. I am just like him. And Ender hated himself." (Card 33). These things are not tolerated at the school but there is a difference on the shuttle and at the school.