The Red Pencil

Fiction | Novel/Book in Verse | Middle Grade | Published in 2014

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1, Chapters 1-32

Part 1, Chapters 33-79

Part 2, Chapters 80-112

Part 2, Chapters 113-145

Part 2, Chapters 146-180

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Part 2, Chapters 80-112Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 2: “Kalma”

Part 2, Chapters 80-94 Summary

Part 2 takes place between April 2004 and June 2004. This section covers Chapter 80: “Scraps,” Chapter 81: “Disbelief,” Chapter 82: “Vanishing,” Chapter 83: “Mourning,” Chapter 84: “Rubber Twigs,” Chapter 85: “Silence,” Chapter 86: “Crowded Kalma,” Chapter 87: “Echo,” Chapter 88: “Locked,” Chapter 89: “The Water Giver,” Chapter 90: “The Flicker Box,” Chapter 91: “Stuck,” Chapter 92: “Flowers,” Chapter 93: “Blowing Smoke,” and Chapter 94: “Nonstop.”

Kalma is crowded with people, “bodies: / clustered and wondering, / Why are we here?” (153). The camp is a mixture of cultures, of people forced to flee their peaceful homes because of the Janjaweed, sharing their sadness despite their differences.

Amira’s family’s new house is made of plastic and rice-bag scraps, with a roof patched together from dead roots; she wonders how this can be a home. Amira replays the Janjaweed attack in her mind: She remembers the bullets, the screams, and Dando falling, though she still can’t believe her father is gone. Muma cries at night, not wanting her daughters to see her grief. Although Leila is asleep, Amira is awake and aware of her mother’s sobbing, taking note of her tear-stained face in the morning.

Amira feels something slipping away from her and realizes it is words; she struggles to speak, and her voice is vanishing. This part of the novel (“Vanishing”) is arranged in broken, cascading lines, with spaces between the letters and words to mirror Amira’s growing silence.

The soil at Kalma is unlike the goz: It is dark, dry, and smelly, a “sour mix of rot / and sorrow, / rancid trash, / decaying memories” (150). The twigs, too, are limp and rubbery; Amira has to wrestle hard to break one off a tree. She doesn’t feel like drawing in the “rancid” soil with these “meek” twigs; she mourns the loss of her “hand’s dance” and her “sparrow’s wings.” Amira falls completely silent.

A silent Amira hears a bird calling “from some smothered place / that feels like it belongs to [her]” (156). She feels the bird fighting to make sound, even as it continues to be held down and suffocated. Muma tries to coax Amira into speaking again, repeating words for her to say. Amira knows them all but feels unable to repeat them. Muma tells Amira that only time will help her, as “sorrow’s fence / has locked [her] in” (159).

Without a river like the one back home, water is doled out in rations at Kalma. Women stand in long lines to collect one gallon per person every day, which must be used for everything from bathing to drinking. Amira prays that the water giver’s hand will slip and give a little extra, as she stands in line with Muma. While waiting in line, the women talk to each other about things like the heat or the mosquitoes; they never talk about the future, which is uncertain, or the past, as they have no home to return to. One old woman calls Kalma a “sharp-eared wolf / that cannot be held or released / from the grip of an uncertain hand” (164): Both entering and leaving are dangerous. Other elders join in, discussing how it is dangerous to leave as the Janjaweed lurk outside; despite hearing all this, Amira can’t help but wonder what else is possible.

Trash bag scraps in all colors are scattered across the camp, catching onto anything that lets them cling. Amira calls them “Sudanese flowers” that, despite the season, are always in bloom, not even requiring water. She thinks they look pretty to “anyone who finds beauty / in crumpled plastic trash bags” (168).

Amira sees a girl a bit older than her being led around the camp by her much older husband; he smokes and spits in public, seemingly unaware of his wife wincing whenever he does. Amira thinks him rude.

Kalma has a television, a “flicker box” mounted on an iron pole. Amira sees “pink people” speaking English on the screen for the very first time. The television is never switched off, though one day, it is muted. Amira wonders if the people inside the “flicker box” feel the same as her, “Shut in / behind their own / mounds of sound / that can’t come out” (170).

Part 2, Chapters 95-112 Summary

This section covers Chapter 95: “Moon-Time Terrors,” Chapter 96: “Unwelcome,” Chapter 97: “Gamal’s Grief,” Chapter 98: “Tantrum,” Chapter 99: “Miss Sabine,” Chapter 100: “Want,” Chapter 101: “Knowing,” Chapter 102: “The Red Pencil,” Chapter 103: “Parting Glance,” Chapter 104: “Straight and Shiny,” Chapter 105: “Blocked,” Chapter 106: “Old Anwar’s Lament,” Chapter 107: “Wife,” Chapter 108: “Inside the Flicker Box,” Chapter 109: “Stirring a Pot,” Chapter 110: “Needle Noses,” Chapter 111: “Sesame Oil,” and Chapter 112: “Questions.”

Leila begins to have nightmares. In the jumble of cultures present at Kalma, Amira’s village’s tradition about the moon becomes stripped of meaning. A full moon is now unwelcome, the light making it difficult to sleep and worsening Leila’s nightmares. Gamal begins to misbehave even more than before, “often two ways at once” (174). He vacillates between wanting to play and wanting to pick a fight. Gamal finds a rubber tire, and when another child wants to play with it too, he almost strangles him with it; however, when the boy calls for his mother, Gamal begins to cry and runs away. Gamal throws a tantrum, demanding that Amira talk; she is still unable to, and his tantrum worsens. Old Anwar commands him to leave Amira alone and takes the boy to the prayer tent with him.

Miss Sabine, a woman from Sudan Relief, arrives at Kalma. She brings two bags with her, one melon-sized and rattling and the other, flat and stiff. Amira is curious about the contents of the bags; a crowd of boys and girls surround Miss Sabine, equally curious. The novel’s accompanying illustration shows many outstretched hands in a circle.

Leila is the first to reach Miss Sabine and greet her; she examines the rattling bag. Amira hangs back from the group, but Miss Sabine notices her; however, she doesn’t ask Amira to talk: “This lady lets [her] silence be” (183). Miss Sabine empties out the rattling bag, which is filled with yellow pencils. Before Amira can collect one, they are all gone. Miss Sabine reaches over the other children and presses a red colored pencil into Amira’s palm. She also distributes yellow writing pads. She is then escorted away by the “intake man,” and Amira waves a silent goodbye.

Amira holds the red pencil and makes a small red dash on her yellow pad; she deems it “enough drawing for today” (189), as she does not like this hard and skinny pencil which is so unlike her twig. Later, she tries to sketch Nali from memory, but something in her will not let her draw her beloved sheep.

Old Anwar speaks to Amira gently, professing how he wishes he could chase her pain away and help her speak; Amira wishes he could too. Though her voice remains buried, there are many questions Amira wants to ask her mother. However, she does not want to vex her.

Leila’s nightmares and Gamal’s grief have begun to affect Amira’s sleep; now, she is the one who frequently wakes from nightmares. She dreams of the people inside the television trying to bite her; but sometimes, she sees Halima and climbs inside the television to hug her, talk, sing, and play “Dizzy Donkey” again.

Amira sees the girl with the rude husband again, washing said husband’s stained underpants. Muma exclaims that it demonstrates a wife’s love, but Amira thinks there is “nothing to love about a rude man’s plop” (192).

Old Anwar finds an old wheelbarrow, which he loads with logs and uses as a cooking pit. He prepares a meal with greens, salt, rice, onions, and lentils; when he is done, everyone eats it with their hands. Amira believes the meal is “made tasty / by Old Anwar’s proclamation: // ‘We are now a family’” (196).

Amira and the others at the camp are constantly being bitten by mosquitoes. The small mosquito net with which Amira tries to cover her space does not effectively keep out the “needle noses.” At dusk, the insects slip under the net in larger numbers, leaving swollen, scratchy welts in their wake. Amira wonders why Allah made mosquitoes. Muma slathers Amira, Leila, and Gamal in sesame oil, promising it will keep the mosquitoes away.

Part 2, Chapters 80-112 Analysis

Part 2 opens in Kalma, a camp for displaced people; the theme of Land And Home is key to this section. Kalma is crowded with a mix of people from all walks of life; this set-up is different from what Amira is used to, as her village saw people partaking in the same culture and beliefs. This new place is worlds away from the family’s farm: They reside in a hut made of scraps of rice bags and are doled out meager rations of water. The soil is unlike the goz, fertile to neither crops nor dreams: Nothing grows at Kalma except “Sudanese flowers,” with Amira struggling to draw and find inspiration for sand-pictures. The “Sudanese flowers” are an important symbol, as Amira’s imagining of these scraps of litter as flowers captures how much the camp contrasts with her village—the only thing that “grows” here is trash. This trash symbolizes the ugly side of humanity, the damaging, lasting effects of violence on human lives.

Despite the differences among the people at Kalma, they have something significant in common: suffering by war. Amira notices how this causes people to only talk about the present; they cannot talk about the past as it is too painful, and the future seems like an impossible dream. People at the camp are fully mired in the present which, unfortunately, is not a pleasant picture. The characters display different responses to the recent trauma of the Janjaweed attack and their displacement: Amira loses her voice, Leila has nightmares, Muma sobs every night, and Gamal turns aggressive.

Amira’s silence is significant, as it is tied directly and indirectly to Dando’s death. The shock of seeing her father die in a violent attack, along with having to leave the only home she’s ever known, is enough to have directly impacted her voice. Additionally, Dando is the one who most encouraged Amira’s voice, literally and metaphorically: He encouraged Amira to dream, and so losing him is mirrored in her losing her voice. However, Dando’s influence is still visible: Despite being unable to talk, Amira has not lost all hope, nor has she stopped questioning things. Even as the women in the water line discuss how dangerous it would be to leave Kalma, Amira can’t help but wonder what else is possible. Though she cannot and will not ask Muma questions so as to not vex her, she continues to wonder. Muma knows it is a matter of time before Amira heals enough to speak again. This points to the theme of Resilience, Growth, and Change: Amira is learning to adjust to sudden change, and the transition is taking time. This is further reflected in Amira finding her new pencil strange to write with.

The red pencil is brought into Amira’s life by Miss Sabine, a worker with Sudan Relief. Miss Sabine only appears in a couple of chapters and does not play a role other than bringing Kalma’s children pencils and paper. However, she mirrors Dando in some ways. Like Dando’s gift of the twig, Miss Sabine presents Amira with a tool she can use to express herself. Just as Dando always saw Amira for who she was, Miss Sabine notices the girl but does not attempt to draw her out into speech, merely letting her silence be. Dando’s belief that Amira is special is mirrored in Miss Sabine giving her a red colored pencil, different from the standard yellow pencils that the other children receive.

Besides Miss Sabine, Muma and Old Anwar continue to be important characters in this section. On one hand, Muma seems to be deeply impacted by all the sudden change, trying her best to hide her grief from the children by only crying at night. However, Amira notices Muma’s pain and feels protective of her, deciding not to trouble her with questions. On the other hand, Muma remains unchanged about her traditional beliefs. She comments on how the young girl washing her husband’s stained underpants is the mark of a wife’s love, an idea that Amira silently disagrees with.

However, Amira can’t help but notice how there is not as much room for her village’s traditions at Kalma. The mixture of cultures renders some meaningless; for example, the full moon only seems to worsen Leila’s nightmares, rather than help or bring luck. Despite this questioning of Tradition and Faith, prayer still serves some role. Old Anwar takes Gamal to the prayer tent when he finds the boy acting out; later in the novel, Old Anwar will also introduce Amira to teachings from the Koran. This reliance on faith without rigid adherence to tradition frames Old Anwar as the most adaptable of the group. He is the one who holds the group together, taking care of them and cooking for them. Old Anwar’s cooking nourishes the body and soul, with Amira noting how the food tastes good because of his assertion that they are family now. Food is something that strengthens Amira’s relationship with Old Anwar later in the novel as well, as he becomes a surrogate parent to her.

Besides Amira’s red pencil and Old Anwar’s food, an important symbol that appears in this section is the television at Kalma. The “flicker box,” as Amira calls it, presents her with a view of a different world for the very first time. This and the different cultures at Kalma will contribute to opening her mind to new possibilities.