2.5.1
Chapter 5: Key Events
Key Event in Chapter 5: Lola & Marshall's Dynamic
Key Event in Chapter 5: Lola & Marshall's Dynamic
Briony abandons the play rehearsal, leaving the twins and Lola bored and restless. We learn that the Quincey parents are divorcing. Paul Marshal enters and, at the end of the chapter, gives Lola a chocolate Amo bar.
Marshall meets the Quinceys
Marshall meets the Quinceys
- Paul Marshall introduces himself to the Quinceys.
- Marshall is typically insensitive, upsetting the Quincey twins with his careless admission that he has read about their parents in the press.
Lola's scolding & confusion
Lola's scolding & confusion
- Lola to Marshall: “Then I’ll thank you not to talk about them in front of the children” (p59).
- Lola takes on the role of parent or adult in scolding Marshall, mimicking what she expects her parents would say.
- But we learn that this is just a front which masks her feelings of uncertainty and confusion: “her heart was beating painfully hard… she did not understand…”.
Lola's innocence
Lola's innocence
- Lola, still an adolescent, is easily manipulated by Marshall’s compliment, “You’ve jolly good taste in clothes”.
- Even as she tries to impress Marshall with her maturity in recounting how she went to the London Palladium to see Hamlet, she betrays her innocence when describing how she spilled a “strawberry drink” on her “frock”.
- Lola is vulnerable, caught between childhood and adulthood.
Key Event in Chapter 5: The Amo Bar
Key Event in Chapter 5: The Amo Bar
Paul Marshall gives Lola one of his chocolate Amo bars. The chocolate bar initiates an unsettling moment of intimacy between Marshall and Lola.
Quotation: Amo chocolate bar
Quotation: Amo chocolate bar
- “Paul Marshall sat back in the armchair, watching her closely… He crossed and uncrossed his legs. Then he took a deep breath. “Bite it”, he said softly. “You’ve got to bite it”” (p62).
Marshall's pleasure
Marshall's pleasure
- Marshall’s evident pleasure in watching Lola try the chocolate bar is uncomfortable, particularly with Marshall’s focus on the sensual.
- The atmosphere is not quite right (even the twins recognise “that no adult had business with sweets”) and it is difficult to avoid the suspicion that Marshall is using the chocolate to lure or ‘groom’ Lola.
Marshall's comment & tension
Marshall's comment & tension
- Readers will still have Marshall’s curious comment of Lola reminding him of his favourite sister fresh in their memory and also of the narrator’s account of Marshall waking “uncomfortably aroused” after a dream involving “his young sisters”.
- The tension increases at the end of the chapter as Lola, laughing, calls on the twins to leave. She will be alone with Marshall.
1Introduction to Atonement
1.1Introduction & Background to Atonement
1.2Focus of Your Exam: Crime Texts
2Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part One
2.6Chapter 6
2.10Chapter 10
2.11Chapter 11
2.12Chapter 12
2.13Chapter 13
2.14Chapter 14
3Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part Two
3.1Pages 191-201: To the Farmhouse
3.2Pages 202-213: The Night in the Barn
3.3Pages 214-226: The Attack
3.4Pages 226-234: Robbie's Reflections
3.5Pages 234-246: To the Bridge over the Canal
3.6Pages 246-254: Arrival at Dunkirk
3.7Pages 254-265: To the Cellar
4Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part Three
4.1Pages 269-277: London, 1940
4.2Pages 277-286: Briony as Writer
4.3Pages 287-315: Victims of War
4.4Pages 315-327: Lola & Paul Marshall’s Wedding
4.5Pages 328-349: The Visit
5Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part Four
5.1Epilogue: London, 1999 - Pages 353-371
6Key Character Profiles
6.1Briony Tallis
6.2Robbie Turner
6.3Cecilia Tallis
6.5Paul Marshall
6.6Emily Tallis
7Key Themes
7.1Introduction to Crime Texts
7.2Crimes in Atonement
7.3Criminals in Atonement
7.4Victims in Atonement
7.5Detection in Atonement
7.6Settings in Atonement
7.7Guilt & Punishment in Atonement
8Writing Techniques
9Context
9.1Historical Context
9.2Social Context
9.3Literary Context
10Critical Debates
10.1Marxist Literary Criticism
Jump to other topics
1Introduction to Atonement
1.1Introduction & Background to Atonement
1.2Focus of Your Exam: Crime Texts
2Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part One
2.6Chapter 6
2.10Chapter 10
2.11Chapter 11
2.12Chapter 12
2.13Chapter 13
2.14Chapter 14
3Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part Two
3.1Pages 191-201: To the Farmhouse
3.2Pages 202-213: The Night in the Barn
3.3Pages 214-226: The Attack
3.4Pages 226-234: Robbie's Reflections
3.5Pages 234-246: To the Bridge over the Canal
3.6Pages 246-254: Arrival at Dunkirk
3.7Pages 254-265: To the Cellar
4Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part Three
4.1Pages 269-277: London, 1940
4.2Pages 277-286: Briony as Writer
4.3Pages 287-315: Victims of War
4.4Pages 315-327: Lola & Paul Marshall’s Wedding
4.5Pages 328-349: The Visit
5Chapter Summaries & Analysis: Part Four
5.1Epilogue: London, 1999 - Pages 353-371
6Key Character Profiles
6.1Briony Tallis
6.2Robbie Turner
6.3Cecilia Tallis
6.5Paul Marshall
6.6Emily Tallis
7Key Themes
7.1Introduction to Crime Texts
7.2Crimes in Atonement
7.3Criminals in Atonement
7.4Victims in Atonement
7.5Detection in Atonement
7.6Settings in Atonement
7.7Guilt & Punishment in Atonement
8Writing Techniques
9Context
9.1Historical Context
9.2Social Context
9.3Literary Context
10Critical Debates
10.1Marxist Literary Criticism
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