The Chocolate War

The Chocolate War

By Robert Cormier

Pantheon Books, 1974. 253 pages. Fiction.

ISBN: 9780394828053

Reading/Interest Level: Ages 14+

Curriculum ties: Bullying, honor, loyalty, morality

Booktalk Ideas: Stand up!: Give a brief explanation of Cormier’s inspiration for this book, and how his imagination ran wild.

Challenge Issues: Language, violence, objectification of women

Challenge Response: First Defense File

Reader’s Annotation:

In a school ran by a super-secret society of students, one teen will defy orders given to him and “disturb the universe.”

Plot Summary:

It’s Jerry Renault’s first year at Trinity High School, an all-boys Catholic school. The student body live in fear (and awe) of the Vigils, a secret group that assigns tasks to their classmates. These assignments are varied, but generally designed to injure the student psychologically.

Trinity holds a fundraising chocolate sale every year that is supposedly voluntary, but every student is expected to participate. At the next Vigil meeting, Jerry is called in for an assignment. Jerry must refuse to participate in the chocolate sale for 10 days. After that, he is supposed to start selling. It is a great struggle for Jerry to refuse every day, but when it becomes common knowledge that his refusal is due to a Vigil assignment, everyone is looking forward to the end of the 10 days. When it comes, Jerry fully intends to start selling the chocolates. However, when Jerry’s name is called out, he once again refuses. Everyone is caught off guard, even Jerry as he decides to see what happens when he disturbs the universe.

Critical Evaluation:

There are strong themes of good and evil in this novel with Jerry as a Christ-like figure, and Archie, the assigner of the Vigils, as an archetype for the devil. Archie designs assignments to inflict psychological harm, and then convinces people to carry the plan out themselves, fearing the consequences for not completing the assignment worse than the consequences of the actual assignment.

The reader sees what happens in both instances based on how the Goober is affected after the Room 19 incident. He will be forever changed and scarred. Then there’s Jerry who refuses to do the assignment of selling chocolates and in retaliation Archie forces Jerry into a disastrous boxing match with the school bully. Just like the Goober, Jerry will never be the same after that match, showing that when a corrupt and evil organization has power there are no winning scenarios. Everyone will lose no matter what. It’s a bleak picture that Cormier paints, but at the same time one that he’s warning readers about. Through his depiction of a corrupt high school, which could really be anywhere, not just a school, Cormier shows that resisting corruption is the only way for everyone to live peacefully and happily.

About the Author:

The beloved author of such quintessential young adult novels as The Chocolate War and I Am the Cheese began writing at age 12 and never looked back. His first published work was a short story he wrote in college, which was submitted to a magazine by his teacher without his knowledge. Cormier then went on to work as a newspaper reporter and columnist for 30 years. He has won many prizes, both for his journalistic work and for his young adult novels. Perhaps the award that makes him most proud is the prestigious Margaret A. Edwards Award, presented by the Young Adult Library Services Association, a division of the American Library Association in recognition of authors who provide young adults with a window through which they can view the world, and which help them to grow and understand themselves and their role in society.

Cormier was born and raised in Leominster, Massachusetts. He and his wife, Connie, have four grown children. An avid traveler, Cormier visited nearly every state in the U.S. In his spare time, he read, something he recommended all aspiring writers should spend considerable time doing. Among the authors he considered inspirational are Graham Greene, J.D. Salinger, Thomas Wolfe, Ernest Hemingway, William Saroyan, Brian Moore, and John O'Hara. Cormier also enjoyed watching movies on his VCR, listening to music everything from Dixieland jazz to ABBA to the Rolling Stones to Bing Crosby and walking for exercise. He passed away November 2, 2000.

-from Scholastic.com author page-

Justification of Selection:

This book can be used as a great tool to teach about morality and standing up for your beliefs.