Synopsis of the Final Chapter of “The Chrysalids”  

Chapter 18 of “The Chrysalids” by Alexandra Yee and Ari Neville starts off ten to fifteen years after the initial arrival of David, Rosalind, and Petra to Zealand. A homeless looking and depressed David as the narrator, begins to tell of how new and exciting things seemed to be upon the first week of living in Zealand. He talks of sky scrapers, cars, helicopters, and being with his own people. He then tells of how things soon took a turn for the worse. Weeks turned to months, and David and Rosalind still hadn’t found jobs, things were looking bleak. Later in the comic, David explains how due to the complexities of Zealand technology, and the simplicity of Waknuk technology, David and Rosalind couldn’t operate any modern technology, and found it hard to cope, giving this as the reason why they couldn’t get jobs. Imagine going from horse and buggy, to car and helicopter? As a result of their lack of jobs, Rosalind, David, and Petra become homeless. It is soon discovered, that immediately upon arrival in Zealand, Petra’s brain was operated on to determine the reason for her powerful projection, the doctors made a fumble and left Petra unable to send or receive thought shapes. Besides that, Petra had constant migraines due to the operation. Petra soon turned to alcohol to numb the pain of the migraines, and the anguish of being ostracized by other mind readers. Petra’s alcoholism affects everyone negatively. David becomes depressed. Between the homelessness, and Petra’s alcoholism, Rosalind stays strong but is obviously frightened by the whole ordeal. Before they know it 5 years pass, and Petra commits suicide. The constant pain and bullying take its toll. The story ends with David remembering what a Zealand citizen said to him “you’re really going to like it here.” In our story we decided to use the motif of suicide, as shown by the tragic demise of Petra. We also included Rosalind’s brain getting operated on, as the Zealand people are very advanced and could easily identify neurologically, what made Petra so special. Alexandra and I intentionally took a turn for the gloomy, as we thought our ending would contrast well with the relatively happy ending of chapter 17.