On the last day of school before spring break, we watched a video that showed a similar story to The Poisonwood Bible.

The first and probably the most obvious comparison between the two pieces is the fathers in both of these stories. They are both the guiding hand of their families and will not accept anyone else's opinion. They both have to always do it their way and no one can tell them what to do. They also have this absurd belief that they are helping everyone they come in contact with. Nathan in the Poisonwood Bible hopes to save the people of the Congo by bringing them the Holy Spirit. He doesn't understand that the people are rejecting Jesus and they don't want help or salvation. In Mosquito Coast, Allie pushes his inventions onto the villagers around him and is convinced that the inventions will help modernize the simple natives. Although one man attempts to spread religion and the other wants to spread science they both have the idea that they can change the land they have come upon. In both cases, this belief is proved wrong. In the Poisonwood Bible, the Congo is not changed by anything brought by Nathan Price from Kentucky Wonder Beans to Christianity. Instead, Africa devoured these things and claimed them as its own. Similarly in Mosquito Coast, the place does not readily accept the inventions brought from America. For example, the people were thrilled with the ice machine at first, but in the end the invention was destroyed and Mosquito Coast remained unchanged. Instead the destruction of the ice machine changed Allie just as the incident with the vegetable garden changed Nathan Price. Both men found that their American way of doing things would not work in their new environment.

Another similarity can be found between Leah and Charlie. Both of these characters simple adore their father. In Mosquito Coast, Charlie says that he thought the world belonged to his father. He thought that everything his father said was true. Leah had similar feelings for her father. The Poisonwood Bible is full of examples of Leah trying to impress her father and win his favor. "I was thrilled by the mere fact of his speaking to me in this gentle, somewhat personal way"(77). This quote shows what kind of adoration Leah has for her father. She is excited just because he is speaking kindly to her. Both children struggle for attention from their fathers, and both children are not granted this. Throughout the story, both Leah and Charlie begin to change in the same way. As they start to realize their fathers are not always right, they start to lose faith and respect for them. After their beach house is swept away in the storm, Charlie knows that his father is not doing what is best for the family. He actually gets so angry at his father, that Charlie wishes that his dad was dead so that they could return to America. Leah also begins to rebel against her father when the village goes hunting for animals. Father forbids Leah to go hunting but she disobeys his and goes anyway. She disobeys him again when he tells her not to help Nelson and his superstitions. "I'm going out there to help Nelson, and Father can go straight to hell"(358). At the end of these stories, the children no longer need the approval of their fathers. They outgrow their blind worship and see what kind of men their fathers really were. Mosquito creek ends with Charlie saying this, "Once I had believed in father and the world had seemed small and old. Now he was gone and I wasn't afraid to love him anymore. And the world seemed limitless." Since they weren't just following in their fathers' shadows, Leah and Charlie had a better view of the world.



"Perfection of means and confusion of ends seem to characterize our age." Dante