Essay: "Sleep Rough Tonight" by Ian Bone
Society believes that bad events
exist due to the contrast it has with good events. In Sleep Rough Tonight (2004),
Ian Bone presents Alex Pimentino, a scrawny schoolboy striving for attention in
the wrong places. Throughout the novel we discover that Alex is not only
discovering his identity, but also his place in society. Bone uses literary
techniques to explore Alex’s need for revenge but he is allowed to grow as a
character when he realises that the revenge is futile.
Before embarking on the journey
of revenge, dig two graves, one for your enemy and one for yourself. In “Sleep
Rough Tonight”, Alex is put through a series of tests to become a “man”, Bone
uses irony to show that the tests contribute nothing to Alex’s road to ‘manhood’.
Alex’s tests include, a game of chicken, abusing a homeless man and hunting
down a jacket that doesn’t even belong to him. These actions are not the
makings of a man as they show that Alex can easily manipulated. After claiming
a packet of chips from a businessman, Alex begins to see people as “opportunities”
for the taking. Bone displays the change in Alex’s nature “There’s no way
anyone would call him a wimp or a wuss. Not anymore. He was a hunter.” This
belief that he is masculine is shown when he is sat on by a homeless thief that
stole his jacket. He felt cowardly and ashamed that he was not living up to his
own expectations. He explodes in fury, trying to perpetuate his image of
masculinity “He rolled and kicked with a rage that was like fire inside of him.
It burned through him consuming all the dread and fear,” Bone compares this retaliation
to fire, powerful but uncontrollable. Bone uses this metaphorical reference to
show that revenge is not reliable and does not achieve anything. The futility
of revenge is also seen in the thief’s hideout, the bridge, where Alex seeks
out his jacket. However things do not go to plan and soon the thief is on top
of Alex again, inching him closer and closer to the hole that leads to ‘death’.
Bone once again uses irony as the thief is now taunting Alex, “you showed me
what a disrespectful little jerk you are. A punk kid. A little nothing.” The
taunts trigger Alex’s vengeful rage, “… as furious as the anger that exploded
in him at the cemetery. Only this time it burned him up, ate away at his heart
and soul.” Bone uses personification to further emphasises that through Alex
trying to take revenge, he slowly loses himself. “The Jockey was yelling at him
from the doorway… was he urging him on? Telling him to hit harder? It really
didn’t matter… no human voice could reach Alex where he was.” Bone uses these rhetorical
questions to highlight that Alex’s rage has made the world around him
incoherent; he demonstrates revenge as being a bridge to another world where
the boundaries of right and wrong are incomprehensible. Revenge is a capricious
all-consuming fire that incinerates anything within its path.
The world is a dangerous place to
live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who
don't do anything about it.
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