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The Sword in the Stone: Literary Analysis

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The Sword in the Stone: Literary Analysis
The Sword in the Stone
By T.H White
Literary Analysis by Sean Armstrong
Destine to be a squire, all Wart had to do was draw a sword from a stone to become the king of England. In T.H Whites The Sword in the Stone, Wart is a young boy who has always dreamed of one day becoming a black knight, but couldn’t because he wasn’t Sir Ector’s kin. So instead Wart was appointed a less glorious status, to be the squire of his older half brother Kay. Wart the main character in the novel responded to his ever changing circumstances through curiosity, Fearlessness and kindness. Pulling the sword from the anvil on a stone would revolutionize his life forever. Curiosity can either be a good or a bad thing, depending on how far you go, the quote “curiosity kills the cat” was challenged by Wart thought the book. First the Wart had a desire to become a perch in the castles moat, so Merlyn the magician who is also Wart and Kay tutor transformed Wart in a perch. Moments later the wart curiosity became a reality, and he was being morphed in an undersized perch “I think I should like to be a perch,” he said. “They are braver than the silly roach and not quite as slaughterous as the pike are.” said the Wart. As a fish the Wart learned how to swim and protect himself from predators. Secondly wart wanted to become a hawk, so once again Merlyn altered Wart’s body into that of hawks. Wart spent the night in an enclosure with other hawks, going thru the initiation to become a member of the group. As soon as dawn broke Merlyn took back Wart and changed him back to himself. “You know you will want to turn me into a hawk when you want to,” exclaimed the Wart. His curiosity got him a once in a life time opportunity to become an animal lots of people dream to be like. Thirdly Wart was transformed into a snake by the magic of Merlyn. As a snake Wart learned about there anatomy, how they hibernate and there fear humans chasing them. "Whether it was the voice of the snake, or the cold, or the



Bibliography: White, T.H. The Sword in the Stone. England: Clays Ltd, 1938 2013 Goodreads Inc. “William Shakespeare quotes.” [Online] Available http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/947.William_Shakespeare, 2013

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