Question #1 revised

Geoffrey Trease in his novel “Cue for Treason” examines a boy named Peter that is forced to become heroic and brave to save Queen Elizabeth. However, before he becomes the heroic character that he becomes, he runs away and hides. This is because he threw a rock at Sir Phillip, who is a cruel knight that controls the Law and lots of evil men working for him, and he is after Peter. Indeed Peter was a coward when he was running away, but there must be a reason that Geoffrey Trease chose him as the main character. The reason is that even though Peter runs away, he comes back later with more knowledge and strength to conquer his problem. Therefore, through the use of Peter, Geoffrey Trease suggests that hiding from one’s problems, examining solutions to fix it, then facing it is the best way to overcome difficult times.

In the first couple of chapters, Peter gets himself into a heap of trouble, facing the possibility of death many times. This trouble is sparked when Sir Phillips arrives with his horsemen to the wall oh his family’s land. This wall was in their possession but Sir Phillip still wanted it down. Peter, taking responsibility of the problem thinks quickly and decides to throw a rock at Sir Phillip; however the rock did reach its target. This is when Peter runs away, knowing that Sir Phillip, his men, and the Law are after him. However, Peter is the protagonist in the story and usually, in novels, the protagonist overcomes the problem without the need to run away. Geoffrey Trease uses his message in order to explain why he chose Peter as the protagonist.

The oddity of using a protagonist that runs’ away not facing their own problems is explained when the reader examines the author’s theme. Geoffrey Trease is illustrating throughout the book that even though one may hide from their fears and problems, they must face them with greater knowledge on the problem and fix it. His message explains the necessity for Peter to run away because from running away, he has found refuge from Sir Phillip and can find ways to solve that problem; in this case, stopping a conspiracy. In the conclusion of the story, Peter comes back with help from the Secret Service to put an end to Sir Phillip and his evil crew. However, either hiding from one’s own fears or facing them is examined in this story. Hence, through the use of Peter, he illustrates that running away from one’s own problems and facing them with greater wisdom is essential to overcome one’s problems.

Geoffrey Trease's message also coincides with real life incidents from people’s lives. For example, when the Canadian troops had to back out from the Afghanistan terrorist’s forward defences. They retreated and hid, like Peter in the novel. Indeed they hid like Peter but also parallel to Peter’s actions, they waited for defences and attacked with greater wisdom from aerial images. Therefore, Geoffrey Trease’s message does not only serve a use for a story, but to real life incidents too.