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Essay Samples on Hatchet

The theme of never giving up in gary paulsen's "hatchet".

Gary Paulsen’s Young adult fiction story, Hatchet, takes place on a small island, an island with no people where he is alone. Brian got in this situation as the pilot of the plane he was on had died and Brian with no experience of flying...

Literature Analysis of the Young Adult Book 'Hatchet'

There are seven key characteristics of young adult literature. Some of these features include the book being written from the viewpoint of young people. Young people are expected to solve their problems even though they may get some support from adults. These stories are made...

• Literary Devices
• Youth Culture

The Theme of Survival in "Hatchet" by Gary Paulsen

In Gary Paulsen's novel, "Hatchet," Brian Robinson is a 13-year-old city boy who lives in Hampton, New York, and is going through a tough time as his parents are getting a divorce. Brian has to ride a plane all by himself from Hampton, New York,...

• Book Review

Role of Hope and Perseverance in the Survival in the Novel 'Hatchet'

Survival. Humans have a weird way of them to persevere and overcome seemingly impossible opposition. Some may associate this with Charles Darwin’s theory “survival of the fittest.” Some may also associate this with the psychological term “the fight or flight response.” However, survival solely depends...

• Perseverance

Best topics on Hatchet

1. The Theme of Never Giving Up in Gary Paulsen’s “Hatchet”

2. Literature Analysis of the Young Adult Book ‘Hatchet’

3. The Theme of Survival in “Hatchet” by Gary Paulsen

4. Role of Hope and Perseverance in the Survival in the Novel ‘Hatchet’

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Analysis of a Theme in Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet

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A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides that feature detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, quotes, and essay topics.

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Summary and Study Guide

Hatchet , a Newbery Award-winning novel published in 1987 by author Gary Paulsen, is an esteemed story about a young boy’s struggle to survive after his airplane crashes in the Canadian wilderness. This work of young adult fiction appeals to readers of all ages for its descriptive prose and exciting plot. This guide refers to the 1999 First Aladdin Paperbacks edition.

Plot Summary

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Thirteen-year-old Brian Robeson is in the middle of his parent’s divorce and struggling to contain a dark secret: He knows his mother had an affair that caused the divorce. His father does not know. Brian is angry with his mother when he boards a small two-seater airplane bound for Canada, where he will spend the summer with his father. Just before Brian leaves, his mother gives him a hatchet, which he fastens to his belt even though he finds it slightly embarrassing. He doesn’t tell his mother why he is so angry with her, he only broods and refuses to speak to her.

As Brian and the pilot settle in to their flight, the pilot asks if Brian would like to fly the plane. He assures Brian that it is easier than it looks, so Brian gives it a try. Shortly after that, the pilot emits strong flatulence and makes strange sounds. Claiming his left arm is hurting, he tries to make an emergency call for help over the radio. Suddenly, the pilot has a heart attack and dies. Brian is left completely alone and panicked. He tries to radio for help but can’t make a connection.

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When the pilot dies, he jerks the plane off course, and then it flies on autopilot for quite a while. Brian knows no one can save him; it is up to him to land the plane. He decides to aim for a lake to make a water landing, as he assumes landing in the trees will kill him. With tremendous courage, Brian lands the plane in a lake, where the plane dives to the bottom of the water. Brian must free himself from the cockpit and swim to the surface before passing out. Upon losing consciousness, Brian is overcome by memories of his mother and the man she is having an affair with. Throughout the novel the narration alternates between flashbacks of the day Brian saw his mother kissing the other man and the horrors of the pilot dying and the subsequent plane crash.

Stranded at the lake, Brian assesses his position. He has very little on him, apart from his windbreaker, shoes, and hatchet. He is desperately thirsty and hungry, and he has no idea where he has landed. He recalls his English teacher who taught him about keeping a positive attitude. He tries to stay positive and evaluate what resources he does have rather than focus on how lost and alone he is. He finds things to do to keep his mind busy, building a small shelter out of tree limbs and leaves, searching for wild berries, and drinking water from the lake. His first success in eating wild berries (he will later call them gut cherries) results in a night of horrendous food poisoning. Brian learns to choose his food sources carefully and never to gorge, despite his constant hunger. He meets a bear while foraging for raspberries and is later attacked by a porcupine in his shelter. He learns to make fire by striking his hatchet against a flint-like rock after his father and good friend appear in his dreams, giving him coded messages about how to do so. Once he can make fire, Brian can cook things like fish, birds, and eggs. The fire’s smoke also helps alleviate the incessant swarm of mosquitos.

As he gets more comfortable surviving in the elements, Brian notices a change come over him. He feels more grown up and one with nature, unlike the city boy he was when he arrived. One day, a plane flies overhead, and Brian is filled with hope at being rescued. He fans his signal fire, but they don’t see him, and the plane leaves. After that, Brian assumes they will stop searching for him and he will be stranded there forever. He loses hope and tries to kill himself with his hatchet. He doesn’t succeed, and when he wakes up the next morning, he resolves to stay alive. He considers this a rebirth. He calls everything before his suicide attempt the time of old Brian.

He continues to develop his patience and hunting skills, eventually getting good with a bow and arrow, such that he can feast on birds and fish every day. Brian is surprised by an unprovoked moose attack and then by a tornado. The tornado destroys his camp and churns up the lake so much that the airplane shifts in the water. This reminds Brian that there is likely a survival kit in the airplane. He resolves to find a way to retrieve it, even though the thought of the dead pilot in the water scares him. He must first build a raft to take with him so he can hack an opening into the plane with his hatchet. He drops his hatchet while working, but he’s able to retrieve it after many deep, challenging dives. He eventually succeeds in busting into the plane, where there is indeed a substantial survival kit. But Brian is forced to look at the submerged dead pilot, whose body has been decaying and eaten by fish. This makes Brian vomit in his mouth and almost chokes him.

After hauling the heavy pack across the lake and back to camp, Brian discovers that it is full of everything he could possibly need. He feels rich. He now has a tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, lighter, transmitter radio, and most importantly, freeze-dried food. He flips the switch on the transmitter a few times and then settles down to make a feast of food packages. After his third orange fizzy drink, he is shocked to see an airplane fly overhead and then land. The pilot disembarks and can’t believe he has found the famous missing boy. He explains that Brian was all over the news, but the search was called off not long ago. He heard Brian’s distress signal on the radio (although Brian had no idea the radio even worked) and saw Brian’s cooking fire, so he came to check.

The novel ends with a stunned Brian offering the pilot something to eat. The Epilogue explains that had Brian not been rescued, then it is unlikely he would have survived the harsh, snowy winter. After rescue, Brian does a lot of research to learn about the animals and plants he has come to know. He maintains his interest in and connection to nature for the rest of his life.

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by Gary Paulsen

Hatchet themes.

The most prominent theme in Hatchet is one of survival, since Brian spends the entire novel fighting to stay alive after he is stranded in the forest. Brian's actions, successes, and failures illustrate the important roles that resourcefulness, quick thinking, adaptability, and perseverance play in survival. This theme is particularly resonant with readers because most of Paulsen's target audience has never had to fight for their survival in this way before.

The entire novel takes place in the great, remote outdoors, and as such, the theme of understanding and respecting nature is hugely relevant. In order to stay alive, Brian must learn the ways of nature, understand its inner workings, and, essentially, become a part of it. He respects the other animals in his space and they respect him. He takes only what he needs to survive, never wasting anything. These practices send an important message to readers to respect the environment around them and appreciate the various ways in which it can provide for humanity.

Coming-of-Age

This novel is an example of a bildungsroman, or a coming-of-age story. The young, naive Brian who finds himself in a plane crash is not the same person who emerges from the forest two months later. He matures a lot over the course of the story, developing a new way of thinking and a new appreciation for the simple pleasures that most people take for granted. He comes to terms with the Secret that he keeps, accepting his parents' divorce rather than mentally fighting against it. Brian's time in the forest has transformed him into someone new, with wisdom that had not been there before.

One thing Brian learns very quickly while in the forest is that he will get nowhere by feeling sorry for himself. He thinks of his old English teacher's insistence on constant positivity and determination in order to keep himself going, and this gives him the strength and outlook he needs to tackle the problems that constantly come his way. Whenever Brian starts to lose this positivity, like when the search plane flies over without stopping, he accomplishes nothing, so he quickly develops the ability to keep himself thinking positively in the face of failure.

Hunger and Food

Brian’s consuming hunger and his need to find food in order to survive drive nearly every decision he makes in the forest. He makes tools in order to catch food, a fire in order to cook food, and a sound shelter in order to protect his food; in the process, he learns firsthand how hunger and food drive all natural processes in the forest. This is especially eye-opening for readers because most will never have experienced the kind of hunger that Brian does in this novel—this account makes it more difficult to take food for granted.

City vs. Wilderness

The question of the wild forest's difference from the big city Brian left comes up repeatedly during this novel. Brian constantly finds himself having to adjust his city lifestyle for one more suited to his natural surroundings. This often proves to be difficult since cities are environments of abundance and overstimulation, where Brian constantly had everything he needs right at his fingertips. In contrast, he must go out and work for even the simplest of needs in nature. He must even change his way of thinking, remembering that while city life is often driven by randomness, every decision made in nature happens for a reason.

Isolation and Loneliness

As soon as the pilot dies and the plane crashes, Brian is completely and utterly alone. On top of fighting for survival, he must come to terms with the truth of his isolation and battle off feelings of loneliness that could potentially cripple him. Most of the time, Brian manages to keep himself busy enough not to think about how alone he is, but there are some instances—notably after he makes the fire and calls it his friend—in which it becomes clear that, just like anyone would, Brian is craving human companionship.

Hatchet Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Hatchet is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

How long have brians parents been divorced

The divorce was only a month old.

First Read: Hatchet

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the passage on page 93 "city boys and there city ways" mainly shows that

Brian sees himself changing in nature and shedding his old urban habbits and identity. Brian is becomming a new person, much more hardy and attune to the elements, Brian has adjusted to his new life, and can look back on the person he was before...

Study Guide for Hatchet

Hatchet study guide contains a biography of Gary Paulsen, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Hatchet
• Hatchet Summary
• Hatchet Video
• Character List

Lesson Plan for Hatchet

• About the Author
• Study Objectives
• Common Core Standards
• Introduction to Hatchet
• Relationship to Other Books
• Bringing in Technology
• Notes to the Teacher
• Related Links
• Hatchet Bibliography

Wikipedia Entries for Hatchet

• Introduction
• Sequel Novels
• Film Adaptation

Gary Paulsen

Everything you need for every book you read..

Welcome to the LitCharts study guide on Gary Paulsen's Hatchet . Created by the original team behind SparkNotes, LitCharts are the world's best literature guides.

Hatchet: Introduction

Hatchet: plot summary, hatchet: detailed summary & analysis, hatchet: themes, hatchet: quotes, hatchet: characters, hatchet: symbols, hatchet: theme wheel, brief biography of gary paulsen.

Historical Context of Hatchet

Other books related to hatchet.

• Full Title: Hatchet
• When Written: mid-1980s
• Where Written: Unknown
• When Published: 1987
• Literary Period: Contemporary
• Genre: Young Adult novel, bildungsroman, nature writing
• Setting: The wilderness in Northern Canada
• Climax: When Brian explores the plane, successfully obtaining the survival pack but also seeing the pilot’s deteriorating body.
• Antagonist: The dangers of the wilderness, as well as the blindness of a human society that does not value nature.
• Point of View: Third person

Extra Credit for Hatchet

Turtle Eggs. Although Paulsen had already personally experienced much of what Brian experiences in the book, he tried to eat a raw turtle egg as research for Hatchet , so that he could describe what Brian tastes as accurately as possible. Unlike Brian, however, Paulsen couldn’t make himself swallow the egg.

Survival Guide.   In 2007, the father of a boy who was lost in the wilderness of North Carolina for four days credited Hatchet with helping his son survive. A fan of the book, 12-year-old Michael Auberry reportedly managed to find water and survive below-freezing nighttime temperatures during his ordeal.

• Main content

Yes, ChatGPT can help with your college admissions essay. Here's what you need to do to stay within the rules.

• Students who use tools like ChatGPT to write their college essays need to walk a fine line.
• Colleges will likely penalize students who submit completely AI-generated applications.
• Using AI to edit or draft the essays may be acceptable though, a tutoring company founder says.

The education sector has had a rough ride with generative AI.

After the release of ChatGPT, some colleges and schools were quick to put a blanket ban on the bot when students began using it to write their essays. Professors and teachers were left with the difficult task of navigating the new concept of AI plagiarism.

Now, several colleges have changed their tune and are encouraging students and staff to use generative AI as a tool — as long as they don't use it to cheat. However, the guidance is still pretty vague, especially when it comes to admissions and college essays.

"The landscape is shifting, but colleges are not unified in their approach to GPT," Adam Nguyen, founder of tutoring company Ivy Link , told Insider. "If you look across the landscape of college admissions, especially elite college admissions, there are no clear rules on whether you could use GPT or not."

In February, I tested the chatbot's ability to write college application essays . The results were relatively successful , with two private admissions tutors agreeing the essays definitely passed for ones written by a real student and probably would have had a shot at most colleges, but probably not the most selective institutions.

There are telltale signs when an entire essay is AI-generated, Nguyen said. For example, there tends to be a lot of repetition, and the essays are generally mediocre.

"If an essay is clearly written by AI, I think they will penalize the student and that application," Nguyen said.

While it's clear students should be writing their own work, it's less clear if students are allowed to use the tech to help them draft or edit essays.

As colleges grudgingly accept that AI is not going anyway, Nguyen said there's a fine line for students to walk.

"If you fill in the details, restructure the essay, and provide the specific language and sentences, that will make the essay your own," he said. "I think many colleges would be fine with that."

He continued, "I would suggest not using it as a default. If you're really stuck, you could use it to start." He suggested that, as a general rule, at least 80% of the essays needed to be edited and changed to be on the safe side.

"If an essay's really good, it won't raise any suspicion, and I don't think most colleges will care that you use GPT to start, as long as they can't tell either," he added.

Watch: What is ChatGPT, and should we be afraid of AI chatbots?

The Telegraph

Ukraine: The Latest - Analysing Valerii Zaluzhnyi's essay on the full-scale invasion

Posted: November 2, 2023 | Last updated: November 2, 2023

Today on the Telegraph’s  Ukraine: The Latest  podcast, we bring you the latest updates from Ukraine and around the world and we dissect the essay written by Ukraine’s top General Valerii Zaluzhnyi that sets out his view of the full scale war with Russia and how to win it.

Assistant Comment Editor Francis Dearnley summarises his thoughts on Zaluzhnyi’s essay. 

The Economist has published an abridged version, but if I were to summarise its top lines and the interview that accompanies it, I’d start with its stark warning: that there will be no quick “breakthrough” in the counteroffensive against Russia. “Just like in the First World War we have reached the level of technology that puts us into a stalemate,” he tells the Economist. He said it would require a massive technological leap to break the deadlock. “There will most likely be no deep and beautiful breakthrough.” “If you look at Nato’s text books and at the maths which we did [in planning the counter-offensive], four months should have been enough time for us to have reached Crimea, to have fought in Crimea, to return from Crimea and to have gone back in and out again,” Gen Zaluzhny told the magazine. When his troops got nowhere, he wondered if it was his commanders, so he changed them. They still had no luck. He said he only got an insight when he reread a book published in 1941 by a Soviet major-general, who analysed the battles of the First World War called “Breaching Fortified Defence Lines”. He said: “And before I got even halfway through it, I realised that is exactly where we are because just like then, the level of our technological development today has put both us and our enemies in a stupor.” As a consequence, in the essay he lays out in more detail how the war is bogged down in what he calls this “positional form” and what is required to get out of it: namely gain air superiority; breach mine barriers in depth; increase the effectiveness of counter-battery and electronic warfare; and create and prepare the necessary reserves. He also says that “It should be taken into account that the widespread use of information technology in military affairs and the rational organisation of logistics support play a significant role in finding a way out of the positional form of warfare. The need to avoid transitioning from a positional form to a manoeuvrable one necessitates searching for new and non-trivial approaches to break military parity with the enemy.”

Dom Nicholls expresses his surprise at the level of detail revealed in the essay: 

It lists the kind of equipment that they were seeking. Conversations that I would expect to be happening in the Ramstein process, where partner nations gift military equipment and pledge military equipment... behind closed doors. But that’s the point, behind closed doors. I was surprised to see it in the open. I’m partly minded that it might be a sort of secret double bluff.  He talks about the four or five areas that he really wanted to concentrate on but I’ve gone through the essay and I can’t find the word tank anywhere. That was obviously really high on the on the wish-list a few months ago, so I just wonder if if there’s a double bluff happening here. But to quickly highlight those five areas that he said that it was necessary to build up; air superiority, reaching the minefields, increasing the effectiveness of counter battery fire, that’s artillery fire, also electronic warfare, and number five, the reserves.

Contributor Hamish de Bretton-Gordon is particularly interested in that focus on technology: 

Zaluzhny says towards the end and in various parts that we need some new technology, that is what is going to break the stalemate.  And that made me think back to the First World War and the Second World War. If we think about what the key technological advances were in the First World War that made a difference, well, the first one is gas. It was the use of gas chemical weapons in Ypres in 1915 that made a demonstrative difference, but it was very quickly countered, and gas has not been used a great deal since.  Then in 1917, it was the tank that made the significant difference. The tank action in Combray in November 1917 is very similar to the tank action that that we’re seeing in Ukraine at the moment.  Dare I say it, but the other technological advance that made a huge difference was, of course, the atomic bomb, at the end of the Second World War, and I don’t think anybody is talking about that.  So I agree with Dom, I think there is a lot more to this. I think it is a very honest lay down of where the higher command in Ukraine think they are, but I am sure there is some maskirovka in here as well. And I suppose on the political level, the key thing is this is an absolute wake up call to the West. If you completely focus on the Middle East, if we lose in Ukraine, then things are going to be much worse. 

Listen to Ukraine: the Latest , The Telegraph’s daily podcast, using the audio player at the top of this article or on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , or your favourite podcast app.

War in Ukraine is reshaping our world. Every weekday The Telegraph’s top journalists analyse the invasion from all angles - military, humanitarian, political, economic, historical - and tell you what you need to know to stay updated.

With over 55 million downloads, our Ukraine: The Latest podcast is your go-to source for all the latest analysis, live reaction and correspondents reporting on the ground. We have been broadcasting ever since the full-scale invasion began.

Ukraine: The Latest ’s regular contributors are:

David Knowles

David is Head of Audio Development at The Telegraph , where he has worked for nearly three years. He has reported from across Ukraine during the full-scale invasion. 

Dominic Nicholls

Dom is Associate Editor (Defence) at The Telegraph , having joined in 2018. He previously served for 23 years in the British Army, in tank and helicopter units. He had operational deployments in Iraq, Afghanistan and Northern Ireland. 

Francis Dearnley

Francis is assistant comment editor at The Telegraph. Prior to working as a journalist, he was chief of staff to the Chair of the Prime Minister’s Policy Board at the Houses of Parliament in London. He studied History at Cambridge University and on the podcast explores how the past shines a light on the latest diplomatic, political, and strategic developments.

They are also regularly joined by The Telegraph’s foreign correspondents around the world, including Joe Barnes (Brussels), Sophia Yan (China), Nataliya Vasilyeva (Russia), Roland Oliphant (Senior Reporter) and Colin Freeman (Reporter). 

Sign up to the Front Page newsletter for free: Your essential guide to the day's agenda from The Telegraph - direct to your inbox seven days a week.

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Opinion Bothered by your saggy butt? Here’s some perspective.

You’re reading the Today’s Opinions newsletter. Sign up to get it in your inbox.

In today’s edition:

• The graces and indignities of aging
• Jews abandoned by the left. Palestinians abandoned by Biden.
• The South needs to be careful with all its growth
• The best competition schools have to offer

We’re all on borrowed time

As I was writing today’s newsletter, I remarked to my boyfriend that I’d just read one of my favorite op-eds in some time.

“What’s it about?” he asked.

“Ha — couldn’t be you.”

I appreciated the sentiment, especially having passed a birthday earlier this month that seriously pierced my Peter Pan fantasies. But even this aging ingenue knows the truth: As novelist and nonfiction author Anne Lamott writes in her fabulous essay , we’re all living on borrowed time.

The piece is not quite an ode to aging but not an objection to it, either. Instead, with humor and compassion, Lamott describes what she and her husband call “‘the Sitch’: the bodily and cognitive decline that we all face sooner or later.” There’s plenty in there for anyone anywhere along that slope; even if you’re only in your 20s, who hasn’t scowled at a teen’s “stupid flat” tummy?

Still, the best bits are when Lamott, 69, addresses her peers. She writes of the “indignities” of old age and of its “graces,” and of the inexorable pulling away over the years “from brain and ambition toward heart and soul,” a destination at which most “bathe in relief that things are not worse.”

Then there’s also the nudge that “you have bigger fish to fry than your saggy butt.” I’ll be keeping that one in the chamber.

Chaser: Elaine Soloway wrote in 2021, at age 83 , that you had better not help her cross the street without asking or — God forbid — slide an “adorable” party hat on her head.

The loneliness of an American Jew

In the two weeks after the Oct. 7 massacre of some 1,400 Israelis by the terrorist group Hamas, even as world leaders and media organizations decried the atrocities, American Jews saw antisemitic incidents in the United States more than quadruple over the same period last year.

It left Dana Milbank feeling very, very alone.

In a column, he reviews how those incidents include ones unfolding at ostensibly enlightened institutions, and how some have touched even his own family. Some progressives’ attempt to equate Hamas’s atrocities to Israel’s campaign to eliminate it, he says, “reveals a moral bankruptcy on the far left.”

That doesn’t mean that Dana is not “horrified” by Israel’s killing of Palestinian civilians. Like most advocates for justice and minority rights, he calls for an end to the humanitarian disaster.

Perry Bacon is similarly troubled — especially regarding what he sees as President Biden’s insufficient care for these innocent Palestinians.

As he writes in a critique of the administration, “Israel’s bombing seems less a targeted effort to kill Hamas terrorists and more a general punishment for everyone who lives in Gaza in retaliation — and the United States continues to tacitly approve it.”

Dana’s preferred solution is the one put forward by liberal pro-Israel group J Street: “support Israel’s military campaign to eliminate the threat posed by Hamas but couple this with a massive humanitarian relief campaign for the people of Gaza: water, food, electricity, fuel and real safe zones.”

Chaser: Steven Hill traces this crisis in part to the flawed 2006 Palestinian election that empowered Hamas — and destroyed democracy.

From Kathleen Parker’s dispatch from her town of Camden, S.C. — “a poor man’s Charleston” — on the battle over the Southeast.

Kathleen tracks the ways her home has been remade over the years, with ugly new developments stripping the character from what was once mostly a place where polo players wintered their horses. Don’t get her started on the de-charming of Charleston, that rich man’s Camden.

She prescribes some regulation as well as a more general warning that will be familiar to anyone with roots in the region: “Like kudzu, unbridled growth consumes everything in its path.”

More history, please!

Alyssa Rosenberg is a huge fan of National History Day , having participated in the humanities’ version of school-age science fairs when she was growing up. Now, she thinks it might help save the country.

Her column describes in detail how the program works, but the most important thing to know is that rather than teaching history itself, it teaches historical inquiry . Kids leave with a better handle on how to dig into history themselves, whether that’s the record on trade policy with Puerto Rico or on soft pretzels, the subject of an eighth-grade project by Guy Fieri (!).

Alyssa writes: “The best way to prepare children to build a better future is by giving them opportunities to engage with the past, trusting in their courage to do so.”

Smartest, fastest

• China’s naval provocations in the South China Sea are getting too blatant to ignore, the Editorial Board cautions .
• Matthew Perry’s fame was the curse of a wish come true, David Von Drehle writes in a remembrance of the “Friends” actor.
• Jen Rubin identifies Democrats’ all-purpose message for 2024: Defeat the MAGA chaos.

It’s a goodbye. It’s a haiku. It’s … The Bye-Ku.

Gazing with envy

Over a rounding-out paunch

At time’s flat circle

Have your own newsy haiku? Email it to me , along with any questions/comments/ambiguities. See you tomorrow!