Catholicism, Conformity, Control, and Capitalism in the Chocolate War

Somebody let SparkNotes know because my analyses are a million times better than theirs.

So let's talk about the four C's of The Chocolate War: Catholicism, Conformity, Control, and Capitalism.

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So, as you may have noticed, the story takes place in an all boys Catholic school called Trinity. For a bit of background, author Robert Cormier attended a Catholic school himself in his hometown of French Hill, Massachusetts. He really went with a 'write what you know' moment so The Chocolate War takes place in a Catholic school and I don't remember if they specifically say it's Massachusetts but they mention going to Boston at one point and some of the characters in the movie have Massachusetts accents so I think it's safe to say it's in Massachusetts.

I'm going to be honest, I'm not an expert in Catholicism. I'm Greek Orthodox. But my mom was raised Catholic and went to Catholic school, and I actually attended a Jesuit university for two years so I'm not totally in the dark. There's one thing my mom always said- "if you want to ensure that your kids won't be Catholic when they grow up, send them to Catholic school". Needless to say, she did not enjoy it. I can see why Catholic school might be awful for teenagers. They have to wear uniforms, they have to bow not only to regular school authorities but also to religious authorities, they are taught from a purely Catholic point of view as opposed to a diverse education, and I'm not sure but I think they have to attend mass??? which is super boring but they don't mention it in the book and one scene in the movie might be at mass??? so I'm not sure if they actually do (my roommate just told me that they definitely do [Edit: just noticed that in chapter two they mention going to chapel]). Either way all these things are the exact opposite of what teenagers yearn for- they want to be free to express themselves, to learn about the world around them, and to not be told what to do. I'm not trying to diss Catholic schools or anything, I'm just saying in the context of this book they might have a somewhat negative impact on students. Of course, public high schools have issues like this too but we're not talking about public school.

The makeup of Trinity is pretty homogenous, and this is especially apparent in the movie. All the students are white and male, and a majority are Catholic (it is mentioned at one point that there are several non-Catholic students). If the last names are any indication, there are two main ethnic groups at the school: French and Italian, and then there are some others from like I don't know Scotland? Ireland? and I also have no clue where the name Janza is from, maybe Czech? And the name Costello manages to be both Irish and Italian at the same time but more likely it's just Irish and also I can't imagine an Italian dude named Archie. Also, side note, why did Cormier decide to name this terrifying, cold and calculating villain 'Archie'? That's so goofy. Why not just give him a friend named Jughead while you're at it. Whatever, I'm not gonna argue with a dead dude. Okay so basically what I'm trying to say here is that the school is not diverse.

In the film, the only people of color we see are Lisa's two friends. Otherwise, we get scores of young white boys in the same uniform and several monks in the same brown robes. The only individuality they're really allowed is their hairstyles and their coats (and Archie has a seriously nice coat).

Love that 80s hair

So here, Catholicism and conformity go hand in hand. Early in the story when Brother Leon interrogates Bailey in front of the class,  he admonishes the other students for allowing it to happen and compares it to Nazi Germany. I discussed this scene a bit more in my character analysis of Brother Leon a couple posts back, but here I'm going to talk about it more in relation to conformity. Comparing the class to Nazi Germany is a rather serious accusation and sets the story up to parallel the rise of fascism. The Nazi's wanted to create a totally homogenous, unified Germany by getting rid of all those they felt were undesirable- and this actually included Catholics. Of course, Catholics weren't persecuted the same way Jewish or Romani people were, but many high ranking Nazis and Hitler himself were strongly anti-Catholic. Moreover, the USA has held anti-Catholic sentiments since the days of the colonies and even in the 1960s there was a strong pushback against JFK because he was Catholic. Naturally, a Catholic school in the 1970s (1980s in the movie) would be sensitive to this type of persecution and conformity in the general population, which is what makes it ironic when the school recreates it themselves.

Let's go back to a previous post where I analyzed Jerry Renault. There, I discussed how Jerry was moved by a line from the poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" written by T.S. Eliot. In one of Jerry's classes they had to study Eliot as he was a prominent Catholic poet and that's how Jerry discovered his work. The line "do I dare disturb the universe" is one factor that inspires him to rebel against the school and the Vigils. Here, Jerry reflects true Catholic principles and the teachings of Jesus Christ- he peacefully stands up to authority and fights for change. It is also here that the school fails the teachings of Christ- they become the persecutors. It is cruelly ironic for the school that they are the ones who teach Jerry to rebel when they teach him about Eliot and when Leon gives the 'lesson' about allowing persecution. In essence, Trinity is run by a hypocrite in the form of Brother Leon. He condemns conformity but then enforces it.

Jerry's refusal to conform at first causes some students to view him as a symbol for rebellion, but soon they turn on him due to an intensive marketing campaign by the Vigils. One question asked by another student to Jerry in chapter 30 reveals the reason for the sudden change in the students' attitudes-

"you think you're better than we are?"

How come Jerry doesn't have to do his part? How come Jerry gets to receive the benefits of going to Trinity without doing any work? How come Jerry isn't a team player? The Vigils paint Jerry as a smug, lazy dissenter who thinks he's better than everyone else. They also accuse him of being gay, further playing into the homophobic beliefs held by the students and the Catholic church itself. And it's effective. He's no longer a symbol of revolution but rather a symbol of all that any hard-working, honest, red-blooded American man should hate.

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This leads us into talking about control. The whole story is about control and fighting each other for power. As I mentioned earlier, the Catholic school system controls these boys' education and forms of self expression, they are not allowed much freedom. Last week, my coworker was talking to me about her upbringing in the Catholic church. She went to Catholic school k-12th and even stayed at a convent upon graduating to consider becoming a nun. She told me that the system is quite repressive and that repression is dangerous because eventually the darker side of human nature will be forced out. At Trinity, this dark side takes the form of the Vigils. When you control every aspect of a teenager's life they will rebel in dangerous ways to try and take back even the smallest portion of some control. Since the Vigils are just teenagers and don't have any power over their own lives they form a secret society to have power over all the other students. It is the fault of adults that create a repressive, unsafe world for teenagers that leads to them doing horrible things to one another and quite literally starting a war.

Alright, we've covered Catholicism, conformity, and control but where does capitalism fit into all of this? Well, in my opinion, capitalism is the root of almost every problem in the story. I don't know what Robert Cormier's political opinions were and honestly I don't really care to know because this is my analysis, but capitalism is a driving force for the conflict of the story.

What kicks off the main plot of The Chocolate War? Money. As mentioned in my character analysis of Emile Janza, most of the parents and alumni of Trinity are not super wealthy and usually private schools rely on the donations of alumni along with the costs of tuition. However, Trinity and many other private schools are struggling to raise enough money to cover their costs but the families of students cannot afford any tuition increases. The school has an annual chocolate sale to raise funds- fine, that's all good- but this year Brother Leon increases the prices and the number of chocolates that need to be sold. If capitalism and money itself didn't exist, this problem would be nonexistent. Unfortunately, capitalism does exist and is what spurs on Brother Leon.

Now, I don't really like to look at The Chocolate War as one big metaphor (though Cormier himself said that he 'regarded the school as a metaphor for the world' in an introduction he wrote for the 1997 edition) but I do like to look at it as a reflection and consequence of the world. I could call Brother Leon a metaphor for the government and capitalism, the Vigils as possibly the military or police, Jerry as dissenters and revolutionaries, etc. But the world is too complex for such simple metaphors. Instead, I prefer to look at Brother Leon as something created by capitalism- a capitalist. His motivation is power and money and he relies on the labor of students for it. He buys the chocolates with money that he wasn't supposed to use, bumps up the price, has the students sell them, then takes the fruits of their labor and gives them nothing in return. Naturally, this stresses the students out but they see no way out of the sale for fear of repercussions. Brother Leon enlists the help of the Vigils for the sale with the promise of more power, which is the one thing they crave. Or at least what Archie craves. In the world at large, the one thing that compels people to uphold capitalism is the hope that one day they will be one of the lucky ones that holds power and riches even if they have to step on others to get there. Capitalism is so ingrained in American culture that it seeps through and infects even small schools like Trinity. Even the Catholic church itself isn't safe- one of the biggest criticisms I've heard is that it's run like a business.

Capitalism is a social construct. Capitalism is a mass hallucination that can be broken at any time. Of course, it's not that easy to destroy, even on a small scale like at Trinity. What is required to end this hallucination is the workers joining forces to overthrow their rulers. At Trinity, the students can't truly overthrow Brother Leon and the school himself, but they can overthrow the Vigils. The exact number of Vigils is not given, but it can't be that many considering it's an exclusive club and the overall population of the school is around 400 students. Unless the Vigils have over 200 members (unlikely) then they are vastly outnumbered by the other students. Why don't the other students just stop going along with their assignments? Sure, the Vigils got some muscle like Carter but there has to be other strong students that could take him on. Unfortunately, every time there is a dissenter he is quickly crushed. Several students talk of revolt and openly admire Jerry, but the Vigils resort to violence to quell any uprisings, much to Archie's displeasure. This proves to be effective- it's violence that ends Jerry's revolt in the final showdown. In chapter 32, after Jerry is beaten up by the children that Janza hires, the narration says "funny, somebody does violence to you but you're the one who has to hide, as if you're the criminal." Not only is the fear of violence what keeps the students docile, but also the fear of emasculation from said violence. It's quite simply embarrassing for a teen boy, a football player at that, to be seen bruised from losing a fight. That's why when offered the chance to get revenge on Janza and prove himself to be a, for lack of a better term, 'real man' he jumps. None of the other boys want to be subjected to that and therefore fall in line with the school and the Vigils, much like how the threat of violence is what keeps capitalism from falling.

However, it's not just violence that keeps capitalism alive. As I mentioned before, capitalism is deeply ingrained in American culture. Many citizens don't need to be forced into upholding it, they have been indoctrinated into believing it to be the best system. They think that socialists are lazy moochers, they think that communists are authoritarian dictators without realizing that those at the top of the capitalist pyramid are both- much like Brother Leon is both. Archie manages to indoctrinate the students into this way of thinking so they begin to think of Jerry as the enemy.

In the end, the chocolates are all sold, the money is raised, and the Vigils with Archie at the helm have more power than ever before. Then how come none of them are happy? The only real winner is Brother Leon- he makes his money and impresses the school board, paving the way for him to become headmaster next year. Obviously Jerry isn't happy- he loses the war. In the order of the Vigils, president Carter is miserable and has been for the past two years from having to deal with Archie's 'psychological crap', his 'silly games', and acting as 'the big shot as if he ran the show.' Carter hates his role in the club. Obie also hates his role, he hates playing second fiddle to the cruel and demanding Archie. Even Archie himself is miserable. In his character analysis I discussed how he is drained and hollow from creating new assignments constantly, how he's being used by those around him, and how truly lonely he is. He didn't win, he just thinks he did. In capitalist American society, the only ones who are truly happy are those at the very top. The rest of the population can think that they're happy, that they're winning, that they're lucky to live in the land of the free and not in some apocalyptic socialist nation, but they're really not. The soulless pursuit of money and power destroys any sense of human empathy and can never bring true happiness. Archie can have all the power he wants but he will never be truly happy.

In the end, Trinity is not Nazi Germany- it's the United States of America.



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Okay that's it for this post. I've got a couple more posts planned for analyzing The Chocolate War (I wanna talk about the role of sports + masculinity and talk about Jerry's dreams in the movie), so stay tuned.