Literature Circle 1

Psychological Critic

Adah
Adah is different from her sister Leah because she was born with hemiplegia which is a condition that disabled half of her brain. Because of this, she can‘t move the left side of her body, which is why she is always in the back of the line of her and her sisters. She didn’t let the fact that she can only move one side of her body hold her back though. Adah always walked at her own pace, so she noticed things that no one else noticed because they never would take the time to actually look. Even though Adah only has half a brain, she is still a gifted student, like Leah, but Adah is more unique. She has the ability to view everything in her own special way, and she especially likes to look at things forwards and backwards.

Rachel
Because Rachel is the oldest of the four sisters she gives us a perspective of the Congo from the eyes of a self centered, materialistic teenager. She thinks that she is better than everyone else, and is obsessed with her appearance, like a lot of American teenagers. Rachel is pretty self centered, and she tends to only care about herself. Ruth May even tells us about a time when Rachel acted like a spoiled, brat, just to try to get her way. She said, “Rachel sassed him straight in the face, and tried to climb right into the airplane with her things! He flung her back. She threw her stuff on the ground and said fine, then, she was going to go drown herself in the river, but we knew she wouldn’t. Rachel wouldn’t want to get that dirty” (179).