a study of fallen angels by walt dean myers
War can turn your strongest of men modest. The story Fallen Angels is about a tiny group of males who come of age in the Vietnam Battle. Richie Perry, the books protagonist, enlists in the armed service mainly to escape his problemsa bad romance with his mom, a lack of chance in Harlem, and a great uncertainty regarding his foreseeable future. He detects himself in the center of a battle that is more confusing and traumatic than the life he fled. In this novel Walt Dean Myers uses most literary devices in order to help the reader get the hang of the plot. One of the many types of devices Myers utilizes is that of portrayal. In this novel characterization can be depicted through Perrys action and speech, thoughts, and in many cases by his physical appearance. Walt Dean Myers uses many examples of portrayal for the purpose of expanding the character pertaining to the other elements of the storyplot. Myers uses indirect characterization in order to color a mental picture of Richie Perry.
Action and conversation can expose a lot of a persons personality. We see this in the story when Perry is going on his first patrol, for the first five minutes he had to wash his proper hand in the fatigues in least a dozen times. He kept picturing VC showing up and him not being ready to fire. Simply by him cleaning his palm on his fatigues shows how incredibly anxious and worried he was. Following one of Richies fellow platoon members acquired killed, the entire company is at mourning. Richie was going over to one of the men and saw him crying. When he saw this kind of he didn’t talk to him and turned around and walked away. The reason for this was because Richie didnt want to insult his friend by simply seeing him cry. This is certainly an example demonstrating how well intentioned Richie can be.
One other way Myers shows Richies personality is through his thoughts. On the simple, on his approach over to Vietnam, Richie considers to himself I usually cannot eat the moment Im nervous, and likely to Nam made me nervous. The only reason I used to be going anyway was because of a paperwork screw up. This noticeably shows just how tense and nervous having been. Another sort of characterization demonstrated through Richies thoughts is right after he previously written a letter to Lieutenant Carrolls wife telling her of what got happened with her husband. Richie begins considering to himself about what his mother could do in the event she at any time received a letter that way about Richie. This displays Richies concern and appreciate for his mother, regardless if they dont have a good marriage. It implies that he is very caring and sentimental.
The third way in which Richies personality is portrayed is through his physical appearance. As Richie was in combat he began thinking to him self that this individual felt huge walking among them. He towered over these people. He was enormous and having been armed to each teeth, and these were not his people. By his appearance being bigger than those of the VC he experienced as if having been greatly better than them. Another example of just how Richie believed superior to the VC is when he attained Headquarters Business and Vietnamese people were doing work behind the counter. This individual thought they will looked peaceful enough, and thus small. He was six-three, and several of them looked like a good ft . shorter than he was. In summary, in the story Fallen Angels, Walter Dean Myers uses different instances of characterization in descriptive form to show how a protagonist, Richie Perry, will be seen by the reader.
