WARFARE IN ALLEGORICAL TALES: DUCHENE

The following article contains extracts from Chapter Nine of The Magician's Elephant, by Kate DiCamillo. The character who is killed in action is the leading sibling characters' father, surnamed Duchene, rank unknown (officer, non-com, or private?).

The story takes place "at the end of the century before last," id est, the end of the nineteenth century, in a Ruritanian setting, a kingdom ruled by a queen, with a Nordic/Central European climate (it snows in winter), and about a decade after the end of the war that claimed the Duchene father's life.

Mr. Duchene, rank unknown, was a young military man, loving and fond of his wife and children. Eldest son Peter and his guardian, veteran and wartime companion of Duchene's Vilna Lutz (now a decrepit elderly veteran with a prosthetic wooden foot, who speaks always in military jargon), still admire him greatly, referring to him as "a soldier brave and true":

COLOUR CODE:
Countess Quintet, aristocrat
Vilna Lutz, elderly and deranged war veteran
Peter Augustus Duchesne, Duchesne's son and Vilna's ward
Iddo, former regimental pet

"At least with a war, there are well-dressed heroes capable of making interesting conversation."

And there was a time when he had worked carrying messages and letters and plans across battlefields, transferring information from one officer of Her Majesty’s army to another.

And then one day, on a battlefield near Modegnel, through the horses and soldiers and tents,

forever running, carrying a letter, a map, battle plans, some piece of paper that would win the war, if only he could arrive with it in time.

Vilna Lutz’s fever receded, and his words began again to make a dull and unremarkable and decidedly military sense. He had risen from his bed and trimmed his beard to a fine point and was seated on the floor. He was placing a collection of lead soldiers in the pattern of a famous battle.

"As you can see, this was a particularly brilliant strategy on the part of General Von Flickenhamenger, and he executed it with a great deal of grace and bravery, bringing these soldiers from here to here, thereby performing a flanking manoeuvre that was entirely unexpected and exceedingly elegant and devastating. One cannot help but admire the genius of it. Do you admire it?"

 “This is important. This is the work of your father I am speaking of. This is a man’s work.”

about his father in a field full of mud, a bayonet wound in his side. about his father bleeding. about him dying.

Instead it (soldiering) seemed like foolishness – a horrible, terrible, nightmarish foolishness.

“As I was saying, as I was illuminating, as I was elucidating, yes, these men, these brave, brave soldiers, under the direct orders of the brilliant General Von Flickenhamenger, came around from behind. They outflanked the enemy. And that, ultimately, is how the battle was won. Does that make sense?”

 "We were speaking of battles, you and I. We were speaking of the brilliance of generals and the bravery of foot soldiers.” Vilna Lutz beat his wooden foot against the floorboards. “Battles and bravery and strategy, that is what we were speaking of.”

who would and could become a soldier like your father, a man I admired.

"soldiering is a useless and pointless thing.”

of him on the battlefield, bleeding to death.

and battlefields 

He was a soldier, and he died on the battlefield. Vilna Lutz served with him and fought beside him. He was his friend. He came to deliver the news of my father’s death.

When my mother heard the news, the baby started to come: my sister, Adele.

ILLUSTRATION

(The death of Duchene was not illustrated by Yoko Tanaka in the edition meant for most languages. This illustration is from a prized Russian edition, illustrated by I. Oleynukova)


EXTRA ON STUDY FOR THE BOOK

(Peter's and Adele's father) was a soldier killed during a battle.
(Peter tells) the story of his father dying on the battlefield and Vilna Lutz bringing the news to them.

Peter's and Adele's father was killed in a war;

Adele Duchene is a young girl that is an orphan, because her father died in a war and her mother soon died after she was born.

Peter's and Adele's father had been killed in the war 

 the mood of a place haunted by a recent, unnamed war. 

who has lost his father to war,

an aging war veteran who took him in after his father was killed in action,

His dad was killed in war, and his mum was killed giving birth to his sister.  She went into early labor with his sister b/c she was so distraught over hearing that her husband died.  I would imagine hearing such news would be difficult and would cause a lot of stress emotionally on your body. 

Vilna Lutz - a comrade of his dead father who was "a soldier, brave and true".




Flashcard

bayonet

a dagger at the end of a rifle