Student Essay on The Chocolate War

The Chocolate War

Summary:   'The Chocolate War' by Robert Cormier: How The Organization of the Vigils influences the school.

In this essay, I am going to wrote about the role and structure of The Vigils in Rober Cormier's 'The Chocolate War.' The plot is about how freshman, Jerry Renault, starts to rebel against 'The System,' where people obey the teachers and the people with power, at his new school, The Trinity School, and how everyone reacts to this.

The Vigils is a high-school mafia that operates within the school and puts pressure on teachers to give into their demands which benefits themselves. They do this by giving ordinary, non-vigils, pupils assignments to do a certain actions, such as unscrewing tables and chairs so they fall over and break. They are usually actions that people would not like to do. Disobeying The Vigils is not a great idea as they are likely to get you back, which is what Jerry does.

The Vigils have many members including Archie Costello, the assigner. Robert Cormier gives Archie a strange character, hateable but VERY compelling:

'"You're a real bastard Archie," Obie said finally, his fustration errupting like a coke exploding from a bottle after you shake it, "You know that""

Archie turned and smilied at him benevolenttly, like a goddam king passing out favours"'

This shows that Archie KNOWS that he is hated, but seems to like it, maybe Cormier gave him this character because it's that chacarcter that keeps The Vigils in the mind of the other characters of real rats and weasels, who are very sellfish.

Archie is not the leader of The Vigils, he does not have overall power:

"Carter was the president of The Vigils because the president was always a football player - the muscle someone Archie needed"

Carter is the president, but has little to do with the day to day running of the group, which gives Archie the same amount as respect as him, seeing as Archie does most of the group's work, and respect is very important for The Vigils, for without this, none of the pupils would carry out any assignments, which is central to The Vigil's work.

Obie is the secratary of The Vigils. He deals with other members and finding out about others in the school, and writing it into a book:

"His notebook was more complete than the school's files. It contained infomation about everyone at Trinity, the kind of stuff that cannot be found in the official records."

The Vigils have a lot of infomation about everybody at the school, that gives them vital infomation that can help them overcome their problems and put even more pressure on the teachers. This also shows the reader that The Vigils aren't just thugs that beat up any weakling they can find, but more of a group that knows their stuff and use their knowledge to their advantage.

The Vigils have other members that do not do much:

"The members of The Vigils did nothing but enforce the rules... Archie alone was always working under pressure to, divising plans, working them out:"

These other members seem to do nothing but really they do, they are people who make it look like to other characters that The Vigils are very big with many members which act like a small army, but this is not the case, they are there to try to scare other pupils and teachers by making The Vigils appear massive.

The Vigils make sure power in the group is not for definate, there are still ways of them losing it, by something they call, The Black Box:

"The box provided control. After every assignment, it was presented to Archie, if Archie drew a white marble, the assignment stood as ordered. But if a black marble was pulled out, it would be necessary for Archie himself to carry out the assignment."

The black box is the only thing that can stop Archie. Nothing else has the same amout of power. The black box also gives the impression to the assignee that everything is fair and in order, which they know will be passed onto other pupils.

The Vigils have a grip on the school because of their unofficial power over the pupils of the school:

"He saw Brother Eugene still standing there in the midst of the shambles, tears actually running down his cheeks"

This is describing Brother Eugene, an obviously sensitive teacher, after his classroom literally collapsed when Goober, on an assignment, unscrewed the tables and chairs so when they were used they would fall over. The Vigils wanted to give a strong point to the teachers that they can and would destroy to get what they wanted.

This scares the other brothers into giving into them, but on the other hand, Brother Leon is harder to push than the rest:

"'Archie, I don't care about fun and games. I don't care if it's Renault or your precious organisation or the state of the economy. All I know is that the chocolates aren't being sold. And I want them sold"'

Brother Leon is one of the most powerful characters in the book, he can also get points across with pupils, which is exactly what Archie does. Archie and Brother Leon are not much different. This gives the effect on the reader that they do not know which side of this war, they are really on. It almost feels that you are a pupil at the school who is overseeing everything, which I feel is a good and intresting thing.

The Vigils, overall, are a great group. They do not have many flaws, they have the secrecy, the organisation, the ideas, the intel, the muscle and the respect they need to control situations. The Vigils are such a compelling group, if they were any less powerful, this book would not have been anywhere near as good because of the power and influence they have over others. I think the vigils are a great feature in the book, probably the best, maybe in a sequel or prequel, they would focus more on this group and how they run.