Fate and Control

[misslynn]

It was not fate that brought Theo down. It was sad that his own nephew, that he loved and nurtured as his own, turned him in. Yet, he broke the law and that was his own fault. The fire was probably an instance of a twist of fate because there was nothing that could have been done to prevent it. The had their firebreaks in place. Anna's situation was her fate. She wanted a guy that was flashy as opposed to dependable. Unfortunately, that is not going to help you when you are a new immigrant struggling to get by. Her simple choice of a spouse sealed her fate.

[Lildove3]

 Yes, by law we are suppose to be accountable for our actions, but ask these lawyers

 do they know what it feels like to actually lose their minds, and I bet not a one can tell

 you. Personally, I know people who have PTSD, who suffer from depression,obsessions.

  In fact one of my former husbands, even suffred from many types of metal disoreders

  from a nervous break down way before we met, and let me tell you life was like a rollar

  coaster. Therefore, all these killings could be justifiable, but not acceptable to every day

 peoples standards.

[Jennd1]

While a lot of the things that happen in the novel are controlled by the characters such as the actions that send Theo to jail nature runs it own course in the rough winter and the fire.  And while you can't control nature your reacton to the events nature causes can affect your fate.

[Ronrose]

Life is about making choices. Life is like a river upon which we are traveling. We can chose to live life, by making choices and guide it the way we want it to go or we can refuse to make choices and allow fate to chose our paths and carry us along with the flow. Most people's paths  fall somewhere in between. Sometimes we allow ourselves to be swept on by the current of life, being either afraid to make the tough choices or too uncaring of the consequences to our own or others lives and sometimes we stand up and take control, forging new paths to our future.

[marciliogq]

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rkubie wrote:

In what ways have the characters in Unbroken Sky had control over their own lives, and in what ways have their fates been controlled by larger forces? Do you hold each of them accountable--or do you tend to excuse some behavior by it seeming forced upon them by lack of choices?

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I think everybody has the opportunity of building their own fates. If we think of it transfering the thoughts to the characters we should say that Maria and Anna had the same unfornate destiny. Women without their husbands. Obviously, Maria had a man with an unquestionable character and Anna had a totally opposite man. Both of them built their lives in a strange country without their husbands. Anna had the opportunity of getting a new life far from her husband, she had not lack of choices, perhaps she was not corageous enough to begin a new life alone with her children, the same Maria had with a larger number of children. While Maria chose for her child's life, Anna decided not to have the new baby. What we could not forget is that the story is set in 1933. In that time women had not too many opportunities to get freedom. Even thinking Anna was not so resignated as Maria it was not because she didn't have choices, but because it was not allowed her executing them. Still Maria had hope that her husband could come back. Anna only had Stephan's ghost turning around her life and space, which was an out of control action.

[Zephyr_Marie]

Everyone was most certainly accountable for their actions and choices.  Perhaps the only thing they had no control over were the legal aspects of the book, the laws they had to answer to. There were a lot of selfish choices made in the book, I thought. While my heart broke and burned for Theo and his family, and the frustration they had to deal with when it came to Anna and Stefan, Theo chose to do something very selfish in killing his sister and himself in the end. Anna could have stood up to her husband to begin with - her family would have helped her, but she was weak and she betrayed her brother and his family. Then Theo took their lives into his own hand's and left his family to deal with the aftermath of having no home and his wife with a new baby!  They were all accountable for their own bad actions and choices regardless of the situation they were in or outside forces.

[Anna_Louise]

I as well struggled with fate and control in UTUS.  Theo and Anna especially were in control of their lives and choose not to deal with life or its consequences.  Anna being a victim of an abusive relationship always had the choice to be strong for herself and her children and chose not to while Theo chose to take the "easy" road out of his proposed return to jail and his sister being a murderer.

I grew up being abused, in and out of foster care, ran away as a teenager and lived on the streets, got my GED, got married young in an abusive relationship and had two boys.  I left that marriage when my boys were two years old and four months old and struggled for many years trying to make ends meet financialy.  However, due to my controlling of my life, I have a wonderful young man in my youngest son(my oldest son died when he was 9 due to illness his entire life), have met the man of my dreams and remarried now 2 years and last Fall went to college as a Freshman!

Fate does play a role in all our of our lives but we can control the outcome!  Just think what Anna and Theo could have done with their lives if they had been stronger people like Maria!  We all possess that within us; we just have to have the control and power to be strong people and do what is right!

Anna

[fordmg]

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booksJT wrote:
We are always responsible for our actions and the choices we make. As adults we are the ones in charge of what goes on in our lives. To  murder someone when it is not in self defense is unforgivable. When he went to prison the first time it was a misunderstanding on his part. But to just to kill his sister because he thought she turned him in was wrong. I think he should have handled the situation much better than he did. Committing suicide makes him a selfish  coward. He left Maria to clean up the mess he made of his family and his sister's family. In the end he wasn't as strong as he was in the beginning. I also agree with another post that we have little control over fate.

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I think that the sacrafice of Anna's baby was more of what pushed Teodor over the edge.  He could not forgive her for that.

MG

[fordmg]

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KathyS wrote:

I'm going to, obviously, be in the minority on this subject.  My further thoughts on this subject probably won't change anyone's minds....but I'll give it my best shot.

I totally disagree with some of these posts about TOTAL control over ones mind, and making sane and rational choices.  Go into the minds of these characters.  Feel what was written in their minds.  Do you think Teodor, if he were rational, wanted to leave his family, or kill his sister?  Knowing the choices he was making - We have to know that he loved them. 

Do you think Anna was ALWAYS in control of her self?  Do you believe she understood what she was doing when she did all of those insane, and horrid things?  We all are rational thinkers on this board, or at least I hope so, but we can't think that ALL people think the way we do, the way of rationality.

Do you know how many people are driven to murder by insanity?  Anna was beaten down, both physically, and mentally.   Obuse is internalized differently by each victim.  It was obvious that she was physically ill during her pregnancy, as well.  Every day her actions showed us, as she related to her kids, to her husband, and to Maria, and Teodor.  We don't know how long this was sustained before we met her.  Do you know what PPD does to the seemingly rational mind?  All of these elements compounded themselves over time, in Anna's physical and mental  state.  She was weak in all ways.

I was selected for jury duty, to be on a trial of a woman who killed her husband, and her defense was insanity.  I refused to take the stand, because I could not view the pictures of her dead husband.  I knew what it would do to me.  I knew I could not pronounce her guilty, either, because I knew what the mind goes through under extreme circumstances.  The evidence was pointing to those extreme conditions.  

All you have to do is read about the psychology of the mind, and know what obscure forms it can take, and where it goes, when you think they should be rational.  Unless you either live it, study it, or witness it, there is no way I can convince anyone of the inablitity these people had, to make the smart, and rational choice.  Yes, everyone makes a choice, but in what capacity of mind is it acceptable?

Anna and Teodor were cut from the same cloth.  I have no doubt, now.  Teodor didn't always think straight.  Maria showed us this with her strength.  He was subject to prison, something he barely survived the first time. There are some people who will die in this captive state. Teodor was the bread winner, he wanted freedom, with pride in himself, and his family, there is nothing worse than to subject yourself to an unreasonable and false amount of pride....as the saying goes, pride comes before the fall.  Teodor fell, and he broke. 

You may call him selfish, because most people view suicide as a selfish act, because they have no idea what it feels like to be in a depressed mind, without choices.  There is no rational control.  There is no rational choice.  They feel that there is NO choice at all, but to eradicate pain, which is the most unbearable pain one can ever experience.  I honestly don't know what Teodor, or Anna felt, because I didn't live their lives, but I tried to live in their minds, and I can make an educated guess, from all of what this author wrote about them, and from all that I know.

I think there are circumstance we can't always fathom in the human mind.  I don't excuse what was done, but I do try and understand that I can't set myself up as judge and jury of these minds.  I can't, in all honestly, say that these people were evil, or bad....just wrongly judged by the wrong choices they made.  They all needed help, something we were not privileged to witness.  We saw the distruction of lives, when no choices were present.

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I agree with you on this one Kathy.  We all make choices, but we don't always have control over everything we do. 

MG

[bookowlie]

Bravo, KathyS!  Excellent, thought-provoking observations.

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KathyS wrote:

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rkubie wrote:

In what ways have the characters in Unbroken Sky had control over their own lives, and in what ways have their fates been controlled by larger forces? Do you hold each of them accountable--or do you tend to excuse some behavior by it seeming forced upon them by lack of choices?

---

I'm going to, obviously, be in the minority on this subject.  My further thoughts on this subject probably won't change anyone's minds....but I'll give it my best shot.

I totally disagree with some of these posts about TOTAL control over ones mind, and making sane and rational choices.  Go into the minds of these characters.  Feel what was written in their minds.  Do you think Teodor, if he were rational, wanted to leave his family, or kill his sister?  Knowing the choices he was making - We have to know that he loved them. 

Do you think Anna was ALWAYS in control of her self?  Do you believe she understood what she was doing when she did all of those insane, and horrid things?  We all are rational thinkers on this board, or at least I hope so, but we can't think that ALL people think the way we do, the way of rationality.

Do you know how many people are driven to murder by insanity?  Anna was beaten down, both physically, and mentally.   Obuse is internalized differently by each victim.  It was obvious that she was physically ill during her pregnancy, as well.  Every day her actions showed us, as she related to her kids, to her husband, and to Maria, and Teodor.  We don't know how long this was sustained before we met her.  Do you know what PPD does to the seemingly rational mind?  All of these elements compounded themselves over time, in Anna's physical and mental  state.  She was weak in all ways.

I was selected for jury duty, to be on a trial of a woman who killed her husband, and her defense was insanity.  I refused to take the stand, because I could not view the pictures of her dead husband.  I knew what it would do to me.  I knew I could not pronounce her guilty, either, because I knew what the mind goes through under extreme circumstances.  The evidence was pointing to those extreme conditions.  

All you have to do is read about the psychology of the mind, and know what obscure forms it can take, and where it goes, when you think they should be rational.  Unless you either live it, study it, or witness it, there is no way I can convince anyone of the inablitity these people had, to make the smart, and rational choice.  Yes, everyone makes a choice, but in what capacity of mind is it acceptable?

Anna and Teodor were cut from the same cloth.  I have no doubt, now.  Teodor didn't always think straight.  Maria showed us this with her strength.  He was subject to prison, something he barely survived the first time. There are some people who will die in this captive state. Teodor was the bread winner, he wanted freedom, with pride in himself, and his family, there is nothing worse than to subject yourself to an unreasonable and false amount of pride....as the saying goes, pride comes before the fall.  Teodor fell, and he broke. 

You may call him selfish, because most people view suicide as a selfish act, because they have no idea what it feels like to be in a depressed mind, without choices.  There is no rational control.  There is no rational choice.  They feel that there is NO choice at all, but to eradicate pain, which is the most unbearable pain one can ever experience.  I honestly don't know what Teodor, or Anna felt, because I didn't live their lives, but I tried to live in their minds, and I can make an educated guess, from all of what this author wrote about them, and from all that I know.

I think there are circumstance we can't always fathom in the human mind.  I don't excuse what was done, but I do try and understand that I can't set myself up as judge and jury of these minds.  I can't, in all honestly, say that these people were evil, or bad....just wrongly judged by the wrong choices they made.  They all needed help, something we were not privileged to witness.  We saw the distruction of lives, when no choices were present.

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