deviation she is completely ostracised from the society in which she lives and banished to the fringes. Wyndham effectively uses David Strorm the narrator of the novel, to positively reinforce Sophie’s plight by allowing the two to become friends. He does this so David will positively enforce Sophie’s case and thus make the reader sympathise with her. By allowing the reader to sympathise with her plight through personalisation, and developing character depth, the theme of intolerance is emphatically conveyed to the reader. “I said that is my whip”. This quote which refers to Joseph Strorm using the Inspectors whip on David because he had concealed Sophie, who was a deviant. “It was Mary who came, and made little comforting noises as she dressed my back,” says David Strorm. Both these quotes assist in conveying the theme of intolerance by making the reader sympathise with David and therefore Sophie because of his great efforts to help her escape. The Alan Irvin character relates to the theme in the novel of the nature of a closed society. Alan is a good example of how people will believe what they are told if no other answer is available. He believed in the “True Image” and that deviations were the devil because he was told such things were so. Because he lived in the closed off society of Waknuk, no information from other areas was available to allow Alan to question the religious indoctrination placed upon him. “There was a gleam in his eye which I did not like” is a quote from David, which refers to Alan realising that Sophie was deviational. Alan Irvin, after finding out that Sophie was in fact a deviant immediately informed the authorities of Waknuk about his find. This total absence of compassion on Alan’s part was due to his steadfast beliefs that deviants were the devil. Alan however did not decide for himself that deviants were the devil but was rather led to beli...
