Divergent Chapter 3 Quotes
Divergent Chapter 3 Quotes
How we cite the quotes:
(Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote 1
People who get this kind of result are..." She looks over her shoulder like she expects someone to appear behind her. "...are called...Divergent." She says the last word so quietly that I almost don't hear it, and her tense, worried look returns. She walks around the side of the chair and leans in close to me. (3.20)
The book sure takes its time to get to the word Divergent: here we are, waiting ever since we read the title for the word to show up and it takes three whole chapters. But it doesn't disappoint since what it means is huge—that Tris has to make her own decision about who she'll become. Every sentence here reminds us that this is important stuff: Tori's nervousness, her whispering, the pauses.
Quote 2
This is where the factionless live. Because they failed to complete initiation into whatever faction they chose, they live in poverty, doing the work no one else wants to do. They are janitors and construction workers and garbage collectors; they make fabric and operate trains and drive buses. In return for their work they get food and clothing, but, as my mother says, not enough of either. (3.39)
Every faction has its own particular jobs—and even the factionless have a role in society. The factionless do the jobs that no one else wants to do (or that don't fit in well with the other factions' ideas of what's important). What's funny to us is how important those jobs are: a society without janitors is a society that soon will die of suffocation under a heap of trash. So even those on the outside of the system help the system.
Quote 3
When I look at the Abnegation lifestyle as an outsider, I think it's beautiful. When I watch my family move in harmony; when we go to dinner parties and everyone cleans together afterward without having to be asked; when I see Caleb help strangers carry their groceries, I fall in love with this life all over again. It's only when I try to live it myself that I have trouble. It never feels genuine.
But choosing a different faction means I forsake my family. Permanently. (3.36-7)
This book does not waste time with the whole family vs. identity vs. faction conflict, which Tris lays out nicely here. Notice the movement: (a) my family and faction are beautiful to (b) I don't belong here. That's not a great transition; and she experiences this disappointment of not belonging "all over again."