Robie Wyatt's 'Into The Rapids': An Analysis

“He was overwhelmed by the river’s frightful power. The water tossed him around, pummeling him with waves, pulling him under.”. In Into the Rapids by Bradford H. Robie Wyatt starts to drown and needs to save himself from drowning. Wyatt is a strong problem solver and a joker. He saves himself from drowning, jokes about falling in the rapids, and stays calm when facing death.

My first reason why Wyatt is a strong problem is because Wyatt saves himself from drowning. When Wyatt starts to fall right into the river he gets nervous and frightful but remembers the safety talk and, “Wyatt rolled onto his back now, pointing his feet downstream,” This proves that Wyatt is a problem solver because he saves himself from drowning and this isn’t something an everyday kid can just normally do, this takes effort and strength so this proves Wyatt is a strong problem solver. After Wyatt gets away from the strong currents and the little bit less strong currents he finds a crew on a raft and starts swimming to it, “His hopes ignited,

Wyatt thought of his basketball tournament and how he blocked out the crowd when doing a free throw to properly shoot and applied this when he was drowning. This shows how Wyatt is able to use other memories to save himself in danger. This is one of the brain's abilities to use past memories to solve problems. Now he is lucky that he got the free throw because if he didn’t Wyatt wouldn’t think of that and would slowly start to drown. After Wyatt survives he has to make his way back through a river and he says, “He had a new respect for the river’s power. But now the same power was going to carry him safely back.” This shows that Wyatt isn’t afraid of the rivers and he knows he can go through them without worrying he will almost drown again so now he has gained a new power and that power is being the calmest and bravest kid ever and his confidence is off the level making him a