The All of It character analysis

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The All of It Character Analysis: Father Declan de Loughry In Jeannette Haien’s novel, The All of It, she captures many conflicting ideas pertaining to incest, lust, blasphemy, human desire and many others within her characters. Jeannette Haien uses one character, Father Declan de Loughry, to ask her readers if it is not just possibly but wrong for a priest to deny his natural human desires. Society sets up social norms and limitations that at times seem impractical to abide by but could society ever forgive Father Declan of his sin against god? As a reader, we are asked to decide whether or not god would even find him guilty of the sins that society has deemed improper? The All of It opens with Father Declan who has decided to go out fishing for the day on a river beat that seems all too impossible to catch anything. As the day persists, Father Declan reflects upon his clashing ideas concerning of the story told to him by Enda Dennehy, a recent widow of Kevin Dennehy. Kevin and Enda are believed to be married by everyone they know until Enda reveals to Father Declan that Kevin and her are actually brother and sister. Her story exposes that Kevin and her had slept together once but not out of sexual ideas, but out of creation and survival. Enda explains that her father, a mindless drunk, would lock his two children up in a freezing room until on one final occasion he did not come home for almost two days. Enda explains that she has no choice but to do what she did. Enda’s seductive story telling continues with how Kevin and her will leave their father and home for a more enriched life. The question, should you be forgiven, is more of a personal question to Father Declan. His own internal conflict of being able to negotiate between convicting Enda of sinful incest and his own sinful lusting after Enda controls his mind while fishing on that
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