The Boys In The Boat Book Analysis Essay Example

Getting kicked out of your own home than going on to winning the Olympics, who would have thought of that? Daniel James Brown wrote the book, The Boys In The Boat. In this book, the story of a young man is told as he goes through many challenges to get to the places he wants to be in life. Joe was ten years old when he was kicked out of his home by his own family, this boy then went on to join a growing team. Joe joined this rowing team so he could get an education. Little did Joe know, the rowing team he had joined got him more than just an education. This team was able to go very far through thick and thin to get to the 1936 Berlin Olympics. The team then goes on to science the world with a come from behind gold medal. The biggest challenge for Joe was just to be able to keep up with himself, so in the book, The Boys In The Boat, Daniel James Brown demonstrates that character is sculpted through challenges and a well-built character often brings success to a person.

Early on in the book Joe, the main character found challenges nobody would have thought of. The first of many challenges for Joe was when his mother died. If this wasn't just a big challenge to start with, Joe’s dad then goes ahead and leaves Joe. Joe and his stepmom had a conflict. The stepmother Thula wanted Joe’s dad to pick between them. Either Joe gets kicked out by his father and stepmom or the stepmom will leave Joe’s dad. Who did the father pick? Well, Joe was kicked out of his home, so my thought is that the father had just picked the stepmother over his blood-related son. What an awful family. Joe is now on his own at the age of ten. He has to be able to survive so what he does is amazing. Joe, needing to provide food for himself and a place to sleep, is determined to not give up. “From now on, he was going to sleep at the school.”(p.27) Joe had now found a place to stay. Not sure how it's going to work out for him but at least he has a roof over his head at night for now. There was still a problem though, but Joe showing his crafty character he's going to fix this problem. Joe has no food to eat right now, but he fixes that. Joe works two jobs as well as going to school and being on a row team. This guy is a good multi-tasker. Joe’s father works out a deal with the school so that Joe could stay at the school. l for his place to stay. Joe has to chop enough kindling to keep the huge fireplace at the school going 24/7 so that he could sleep there. For his food to eat he washes dishes and cleans in exchange for food to eat. Joe had challenges in the early part of the book and his life, but this didn't slow him down; he was determined to overcome these challenges, which he did.

Joe shows his well-sculpted character when he realizes he is on his own from now on happiness will come from being by himself. Something that leads me on to this is when Joe’s father says, “No that won't work. Look son, if there's one thing I've figured out about life, it's that if you wanna be happy, you have to learn how to be happy on your own.”(p.43) Joe was 15 years old when his father said those exact words to him. If I was 15 and my family had abandoned me then my father says that to me I would give up on life. That's not what Joe Rantz thought though. Instead of giving up Joe found himself doing the exact opposite by triumphing forward through challenges and anything thrown at him. Joe was able to overcome things being thrown at him by doing exactly what his dad said, being happy on his own. Joe was able to keep himself going with this rowing team. The feeling that one of the biggest reasons that Joe was able to keep on going in life was just to be a part of this rowing team. The rowing team was able to keep Joe busy every day of the week. The rowing team gave him challenges he needed to overcome and work through with other people, not just himself. So he was able to be happy not just with himself but with teammates and some friends. This shows Joe will power and determination to keep himself going which also shows great character.

Joe had faced struggles with his family early on in the book and in his life, but now he faces struggles with his team on the lake. They are in a slump well working towards the national championship. The team was struggling to keep up with the school's other teams falling behind in practice. The coach knew what had to be done as he demoted the team, but a little later the team's slump was over and they were back on top racing better than ever before. The team had made a great accomplishment, they were on their way to the 1936 Berlin Olympics. That was not it though more challenges come as time goes on. On the boat, on their way there Hume one of the boys gets very sick. The boys have now reached Berlin, Germany. The team is greeted by someone who is raising their right hand in the air saying, “Heil Hitler.” The boys responded to this by doing the same thing except they said. “Heil President Rosevelt.” the boys had no clue what this hand signal and saying had meant. Bobby is one of the boys on the team, he has Jewish descent in his family. His father tells him he has to hide that he was Jewish. The biggest part of the story shows that the struggles this team gets into always get out of them. The race had started but the British and American boats had not heard the starting signal. The team ends up falling behind the German boat and the Italian boat by almost 1,000 meters. When the German and Italian boats reached the calm waters they were able to glide through the water while the state's boat was still chopping through water, but there was another problem on the water. Don Hume who was sick on the boat over to Germany is now somewhat like an unconscious state in the boat. The boys are now at risk for the race as they are far behind the others and one member of the team is un capable of doing anything. The team does as much as they can without Hume as Bobby shouts commands to the team. Hume suddenly wakes up and gets straight back to rowing. The boys are closing gaps on the other teams as Bobby is shouting commands to the team to speed up the rate. All the boats are very close to one another as they get toward the end of the race. No one can hear Bobby as all they can hear is, “Deutschland! Deutschland! Deutschland!,” being shouted from the crowd. Bobby has no other way to communicate with the team to push up the rate even faster, but he finds a way. He starts to slam wood on the side of the boat creating vibrations that the team can pick up. The rest of the team understands what Bobby is doing and they pick up the rowing rate to a high at 44.          “Bobby Moch was pounding wood, screaming words no one could hear. The boys took one last mighty stroke and hurled the boat across the line.”(p.203) This shows out of all the challenges the boys faced or even just Joe faced himself this was the biggest one accomplished yet. The boys showed great determination as they were able to overcome a very sizable deficit of 1,000-meter difference and come back and win a gold medal. This was only possible because of how the boys were able to work together and pick up signals from one another by doing things nobody would've thought of. This shows the great willpower and determination in the boys, it also shows how well built the boy's characters are. They were able to succeed even after a giant struggle because of how well built up they were. They transformed from boys to men after that race.

“No. That won't work. Look son, if there's one thing I've figured out about life, it's that if you wanna be happy, you have to learn how to be happy on your own.”(p.43) This quote was said by Joe’s father in the book, The Boys In The Boat, by Daniel James Brown. Being happy on your own is a good quality to have in a person because there's not always going to be someone around to be happy with. Joe Rantz experiences this at the age of 10, then again at the age of 15 when his father tells him he has to be happy on his own. Joe’s family abandoned him yet he was able to accomplish great things in life at such a young age. Joe was an Olympic gold medalist in the 1936 Berlin Olympics with his eight-man rowing team. Joe used the words his dad said to him to push himself to the fullest. He was able to be his greatest self. This shows lots of character from him because a great character is sculpted through challenges and a well-built character often brings success to a person.