Ben and Amy

Those documents are two photomontages which represent Amy and Ben’s true selves. It is based on the matryoshka doll’s principle.

Ben:

On the first doll we can see a photo of a “normal” angry boy. Ben looks like a real little boy at first sight. The second picture represents Hester from the movie of the same name. When you look at her she really looks like a little girl but in fact she kills people just like Ben. Indeed at a moment in the book we can imagine that he kills a dog or cat, the author lets us imagine the fact that he really did it. On the third picture we can see a little boy who is muscular and distorted for his age. We can see his anger which represents quite well Ben’s. This anger is not supposed to be normal for a little boy in addition to this muscular body. On the last picture we can see a sculpture of a distorted baby made by Ron Mueck. This picture reminds us of Ben’s birth. At his birth the author described us a “deform little baby” who was “yellowish”.

Amy:

On the first picture we can see a down syndrome’s child. As we know Amy is a Down syndrome’s child. On the second picture we can see a little angel. Even if Amy does not look like a cute little girl she is a true little angel. She is nice and kind moreover she looks more like a real child thanks to her behavior than Ben’s. On the third doll we can see Sullivan from the movie Monster Inc. Outwardly we can see that he is a monster and we can be afraid of his appearance. In fact Sullivan is really nice besides he would not be able to hit a bee. The last doll represents Sully from the movie Monster Inc. wearing a monster costume. Outside she looks like a monster but inside she is just a little girl.

Those two photomontages draw a parallel between Amy and Ben’s true behavior. There is a chiasm between those two children. Outwardly Ben looks like a real little boy but he is in fact a little monster really strange inside. However Amy is a monster (because she is a down syndrome’s child) when we first look at her but she is the real little child here. In addition to the fact that she is nice and cute she acts more like a real child contrary to Ben. Ben kills animals and does not talk to anyone while everybody love Amy. We can say that appearances are deceitful.