Cecilia worries that this has created a divide between them. The two even attended university together, however because of their separation in social class they ran in different circles. Cecilia has been friends with the Tallis' maids son, Robbie since they were children. She is at a loss for what to do with her life next. Cecilia has recently graduated from university and returned home. The next chapter gives us a back story on Briony's sister, Cecilia. Lola continues to mock the lines in the play as they rehearse and this angers Briony.
Briony finally relents and lets her have it. Lola, the eldest cousin (who is two years older than Briony), challenges Briony for the lead part of Arabella. Upon reading it, Briony's mother, Emily announces that she likes it while Cecilia, Briony's adult sister condescendingly agrees. The play is entitled "The trials of Arabella". The moment her cousins arrive, Briony begins to assign them roles in her play and direct them in how to perform. In the beginning of the novel, she is preparing a play that she has written for a performance in front of her older brother, Leon who is returning for the weekend from London to spend time with his family.īriony's cousins Pierrot, Lola and Jackson are also visiting from the north. She intends to write the true story of what happened on that fateful night in 1935 in a book and publish it as her form of atonement.īriony Tallis is an intelligent, creative thirteen-year-old girl living in 1930's wartime England. She has become a successful author and reveals that Cecilia and Robbie both died in the war without her ever being able to apologize to them. Briony has realized too late that Robbie was not guilty of the rape and now feels that there is nothing she can do to correct this and she must atone for her sins the hard way.Īt the end of the novel, we flash forward to the 1990's, when Briony is an old woman. Briony, meanwhile, becomes a nurse in London and loses touch with her sister, who has never forgiven her for accusing Robbie. Robbie is imprisoned for 3 years, after which he agrees to be conscripted into the war so that he can get the rest of his sentence thrown away. Briony's sister, Cecilia, who is in love with Robbie, defends him and later breaks away from her family in anger over their siding with Briony. Later, when a cousin of the family is raped, Briony tells the police that it was Robbie who committed the assault and he is arrested on her word alone. Briony sees Robbie, a family friend, in a passionate embrace with her older sister and assumes that he is attacking her.
It is set in the English countryside during the mid-1930's and revolves around a false accusation of rape placed against a man named Robbie Turner by a young girl named Briony Tallis. The novel's main theme are the idea of personal atonement and owning up to one's past mistakes.
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