The Barbarians Analysis

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Recommended: The use of symbolism in the novel

Unlike the people of the barbarians who live off of tradition, empire has money; laws and order. The people of empire don’t really have a sense of the world around them because they are inside of a cave. “Behold! Human beings living in a underground cave, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the cave; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads”. ( Kreis 1-2) You can say it’s almost like the allegory the cave when the world around you has been distorted in such a way where you believe it’s only that. (C.P. Cavafy. “waiting for the barbarians”) These barbarians have been around for a while and the people who are stuck inside the “cave” are the people in empire. However, due to empire they fear the outside world and they are scared but at the same also curious of the people outside the cave
Because the barbarians don’t have all of the technical stuff as law and other valuable people have nowadays they focus on family and tradition. The writing that the magistrate found seems like it was something that has been here for many generations. (Coetzee 79) Most likely it was left by an old civilization of barbarians with the sole purpose of retelling the tales of old and new. On the other hand empire and the barbarians might have been one and the writings could talk about the separation of tribes. One tribe wanted to remain faithful to their traditions and the other wanted to see the world around them. This would make a lot of sense why many generations later empire has no knowledge about their ancestral heritage.
The barbarians are also in touch with the nature...

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...an identity, he didn’t want to feel mindless and didn’t want to take orders that were morally wrong. In the book he just walked through life blindly and hoped to find the light switch to help find clarity. Unfortunately, at the end of the book he didn’t find it and his search continues on.
In waiting for the barbarians the magistrate deals with a lot of moral turmoil and along the way he converts into a barbarian through torturous means. Along the way he stumbles and tries to find meaning in his life and he finds none. He did however find some clarity by being with the barbarian girl and by studying her people. He does end up picking a side but it is undecided whether or not he will return back to empire. Since empire is dealing with a lot of issues, the magistrate will try to have a peaceful existence full of unanswered questions in which he hopes will get answered.

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