Pages 202-213: Key Events
English Lit: AQA A Level Atonement - Specification B, topic 3.2.1
Key Events in Pages 202-213: The Night in the Barn
While Mace and Nettle sleep, Robbie lies awake, the pain from his shrapnel wound troubling him. He recalls his last meeting with Cecilia before the outbreak of WW2 forced them apart and then re-reads his last letter from her.
Robbie recalls the letters
- Robbie recalls the letters he exchanged with Cecilia when he was in prison. The letters show Robbie and Cecilia create new and heroic identities for each other, imagining themselves as famous lovers from the literature texts they have both studied.
Quotation: famous lovers
- “So they wrote about literature, and used characters as codes … Tristan and Isolde, the Duke Orsino and Olivia (and Malvolio too), Troilus and Criseyde, Mr Knightley and Emma, Venus and Adonis. Turner and Tallis.” (p204).
Analysis of lovers referenced
- By referencing famous pairs of lovers, Briony (the ‘true’ narrator of Part Two) suggests that Robbie’s and Cecilia’s love is of a heroic status.
- However, readers may be troubled by the fact that most of the love affairs alluded to here end in failure or tragedy, a possible foreshadowing of the fate awaiting Robbie and Cecilia.
Test yourself on Pages 202-213: Key Events
What keeps Robbie up while Mace and Nettle sleep in pages 202-213?
Which literary lovers do Robbie and Cecilia quote in their letters?