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Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited

817 Words4 Pages

Religion is such a prominent figure in culture and society. Brideshead Revisited not only focused on the idea of religion, but also included how religion influences family life. Theologically, this novel made me realize the whole idea of religion and the say that children should have in religion. Prior to reading this novel, I never thought about children's rights to choose what religion they want to follow. In Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, Catholicism is the focal point and the family dynamic is influenced by religion. This novel made me challenge my ideas of faith, how I was raised and how it differs from the Brideshead family. In Brideshead Revisited, the Brideshead family struggled to keep their family together because of the …show more content…

She did this by "forcing" her beliefs and religion on her children. Since Sebastian did not believe in what his mother was forcing him to believe, he began to distance himself from her and only want to spend time with his father. In addition, Sebastian felt so strongly about disagreeing with his mother's beliefs that the only way he could stand to be around her was if he was drinking alcohol. This was utterly surprising to me because I cannot image what it would be like to grow up in a family where I wanted no part to be in my mother's presence, and the only way to get me through it would be to drink alcohol. I think I have such a hard time understanding this part of the novel because I grew up in a Catholic family where everyone in my family believed the same things. Religion was never "forced" on me or any of my siblings, instead we had the freedom to choose what we wanted to believe in. In regards to Sebastian "drinking away his problems", the following quote from book 1 chapter 2 exemplifies how these alcohol problems have become more serious. Jasper said this to Sebastian: "But I hear you're constantly seen drunk in the middle of the afternoon" (Waugh 45). Sebastian's alcoholism made me think about my family and how alcohol affected our family dynamic. My mother comes from a very large family and one of her cousins was an alcoholic. Her cousin never wanted to attend

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