The Assault by Harry Mulisch is an episodic style novel about a Family living in Haarlem, Holland during the second World War, the whole familys life s changed by six shots that suddenly rang out, these shots are heard because Fake Ploeg, the Chief Inspector of Police being killed, the dead body is then put in front of the Steenwijks house as Peter realises that his family may be accused of killing Fake Ploeg, he runs out to move the body, this is when the Germans catch him and even the author says that from here on all the rest is a postscript.
The Color Purple by Alice Walker is an epistolary style novel about a black woman Celie who suffers from the severe oppression of black women in the 1930s. Alice Walker effectively depicts this oppression by giving a very detailed account of a woman who is oppressed by men and raped repeatedly.
In The Assault by Harry Mulisch the ending strings the whole novel together as the novel starts with a metaphorical volcano eruption of mount vesuvius and the after effects of this are represented by the ash caused by the assault. When the intrusive narrator tells the reader in the last line that there are no ashes in sight., it tells the reader that all of the after effects have now left their minds. The end unfolds the whole novel as it shows that Anton has now overcome all the trauma caused by the second World War.
In The Color Purple by Alice Walker in the last part of the novel Celie strings the novel together as she writes the letter to not only God but also to the stars, the tress, the sky and the people. In the first letter Celie sends a letter to God and as mentioned in the last letter she sends a letter to God and his creations, showing that at first she only appreciated God itself, but now she appreciates not only God but also all of his creations. This shows that the time although being very challenging and hurtful at times, really made her appreciate life as such.
The Assault is very exciting right until the end, as the novel only opens itself up right at the end, where we find out that Antons father and mother and Peter had died, all because of some lizards. This in my eyes shows that big effects often have small causes, as a massacre of three people was caused by a, usually, 1 foot reptile. It is a very interesting way of creating images and situations in the readers head, as the reader is simply left to imagine what is going to happen, only relieving the reader at the very end of the novel. As the reader will not be expecting lizards to be the cause of everything, he will be very surprised and therefore not only opening up the novel but also making the novel extremely memorable.
The Color Purple also opens up in a very surprising way in the last couple of pages, as the reader does not really expect a happy ending with Nettie and Shug and Albert and Samuel and Harpo and Sofia and Jack and Odessa...so happy this ending opens up the novel very well as it shows people with a lot of problems that at first they are not the only ones but also that it does not matter how bad it may be going, there are always good times to follow. This ending opens up the novel very well as the ending relates to the very start of the novel, as the first thing Celie says in her first letter to God is I am fourteen years old and in the very last line she thinks that this [is] the youngest [she] ever felt. This shows that she feels even younger after all of the bad things that happened to her than she did before she was raped repeatedly.
The Assault opens up as Anton wonders whether everyone was either both guilty and not guilty or guilt innocent, and innocence guilty this shows that although most of the novel has been unfolded there are still some questions to be answered, this means that the novel is not actually completely unfolded and leaves the reader with not all mysteries solved. This makes the ending extremely effective and memorable as the reader will still think about the book even when it has been finished.
All in al I think that both novels The Color Purple and The Assault are both opened up, The Assault more than The Color Purple , by their last one or two pages. In The Color Purple it proves effective to unfold the whole book and show that everything proves to be great after all the nightmare. In The Assault the reader is left with thoughts to think and questions to be answered.
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