Ender’s Game Questions chapters 9-11

Garrett Kitchen

February 12th, 2013

Chapter 9 – Locke and Demosthenes

1.       In the internal and unspoken battle between Peter and Valentine, I think Peter is winning. Peter is manipulating Valentine, by tempting her with power, and acting like he is regretful and sad about the way he used to treat Ender. Peter really has the power, he gets Valentine to write like him, but in turn he has to write like her. This makes it so Peter has more power, because he got Valentine to write in the first place, but they also can’t write without each other.

2.      How Locke and Demosthenes relate to Peter and Valentine’s personas is that Locke was a liberal, just like the type of writing Peter is going for. Demosthenes was a revolutionary, and he was opposed against change, and he tried to start a war with Macedonia. In this case Valentine’s writing is geared towards opposing change, and going to war with Russia.

3.      Ender is still angry because even when a letter from Valentine finally made it through to him, it was because Graff had forced Valentine to write it. All it said was how he wasn’t like Peter, and that made him realize that Graff was the one dictating what could be said in the letter, and the only reason they had her write it was because they wanted to solve Ender’s fear of being like Peter. It made him extra angry because Graff had used Valentine, the thing Ender loved most, and forced her onto their side.

3.

Chapter 10 – Dragon

1.       Ender is a strong, but not abusive leader. A leader one respects and one trusts to lead them in the right direction, but not a leader to be messed with or questioned. Ender is this kind of leader, because of the way he observed how tyrannical and cruel Bonzo was, he observed how Rose the Nose was too laid back and relaxed, and learned good leadership skills from Dink.

2.      What Ender did to Bean was exactly what Graff did to Ender. He singled him out as the smartest kid in his army, and made the rest of his army resent Bean because he made them all look bad. Why Ender did this to Bean is because, habit are formed from the way one is previously treated, but also because it will bring out the strength in Bean, just like it did for Ender.

3.      The word Salaam means peace. What this tells me about the power of religious identity is it forms one's personality, and it gives someone a place to belong, and creates powerful ideas and beliefs

4.      What’s important about the end of this chapter is it tells the reader how Ender feels about the battle school, and how he is going to beat the teachers some way because he is angry with them for making Valentine into their tool, and making Alai a stranger and not a close friend. For the most part I think the teacher didn’t want Ender to have this reaction, because now he hates them even more, and wants to defeat them, because currently they are the Ender’s greatest enemies. The only part of this reaction the teachers meant Ender to have is a little bit of anger, and solitude, because with his anger he will perform better as a commander, and it will bring out the strength in him.

Chapter 11 – Veni Vidi Vici

1.       The computer knows Ender so well, because it can view any file the government has on him, even the monitor file, but it also observes how he plays the fairy game, and can shape it to his personality when he plays the game. The computer doesn’t really know Ender very well it just knows all the physical and psychological information, but doesn’t actually know him in real life. So the computer doesn’t understand what Ender’s true personality is, and how he will act in certain situations.

2.      “Yes. That’s the worst that could happen. I can’t lose any games. Because if I lose any--” (page 198) What this means is that if Ender loses any games the other commanders will see his weaknesses, he will lose against his personal enemies the battle school teachers and I.F., and he won’t be the amazing leader he is to his army and to the leaders of I.F.3.             

3.      The battle school teachers are pushing Ender so hard, because they believe to squeeze the utmost success and brilliance out of Ender, to make him the tool for human survival; they must push him to the limit. During war with the Buggers he won’t have someone to be soft on him; the Buggers will have no mercy.

4.      The importance of the last two sentences of chapter eleven is that it takes the perspective Bean. Before bean goes to bed the last thing he thinks of a dozen ideas for the special task force he will lead in case of emergencies. Bean thinks that all of the ideas were stupid, but Ender would be pleased. Ender will be pleased with what seems like stupid ideas, because to win battles one has to think of ridiculous stupid seeming ideas that will succeed. For example, Ender shoots orders his army to shoot their legs, which seems ridiculous, but actually their frozen legs function as state of the art shields, and if they push of the wall they don’t need them.

5.          “Veni Vidi Vici”, which means I came, I saw, I conquered, is an appropriate title to this chapter because Ender came to the battle school, observed how it worked, became a commander, and conquered as the best commander to play in the War games ever.