Hatchet — Chapter 8

About This Passage

This is the passage where Brian moves from accidental discovery to deliberate experiment. Paulsen gives us the specific geology of the shelter wall — chalky granite, sandstone, darker stone imbedded in it — because Brian's careful attention to what is actually there is itself what lets him make fire. The first try is too gentle, the second a glancing blow, the sparks weak and short-lived; copying this passage trains trailblazers to notice how Paulsen slows the pace of trial-and-error so we can feel Brian learning with his hands.

Narration Prompt

Retell chapter eight as a sequence of five connected moments. First, Brian wakes to the smell and sound of something in the dark shelter and throws the hatchet at the attacker, which turns out to be a porcupine. Second, Brian pulls eight quills from his leg one at a time and cries until he is cried out. Third, Brian realizes the chapter's 'most important rule of survival' — that feeling sorry for yourself does not work. Fourth, Brian dreams of his father trying to tell him something he cannot hear and of Terry pointing at a fire. Fifth, Brian wakes, lifts the hatchet in the morning sun, sees it flash gold, and understands that the sparks his hatchet made against the wall can give him fire.

Discussion Questions

1. The porcupine comes into the shelter by accident, not to attack Brian, and when Brian kicks at it the quills go into his leg. How does Paulsen make this moment feel like a real attack even though the porcupine is not really attacking? What evidence shows that what Brian feels and what is actually happening are not quite the same?
2. After Brian cries until he is cried out, he says he has learned 'the most important rule of survival' — that self-pity doesn't work. What makes you think Paulsen waited until this exact moment in the book to have Brian learn this? Why not chapter three or chapter six?

+ 3 more questions in the complete study guide