When I was first reading Atonement, I thought I hated Briony. In part one, there were many moments where I wanted to throw the evil book at the wall. She was very infuriating. Everything had to be all about her. Then in part three, I felt that she had redeemed herself a bit. Her guilt and attempts at atonement reminded me that she is only a child. Nevertheless, the way she acted as a kid was really a reflection of her upbringing. Since finishing the book, I have been on the search for the reason behind why I seemed to dislike Briony so much. Minus the fact that she sent innocent James McAvoy,  I mean Robbie, to jail.  I realized that the root of the problem is that I seemed to relate to her since the very beginning.

The main thing I related to was her imagination. As a child (and maybe a little bit now), I allowed my imagination to run wild and create stories in my head. I had millions of stories going on, both ones I created, and established stories I continued the way I wanted them to. But unlike Briony I would never write them down. Also, I would never really allow myself to get lost in worlds of my creating when I was interacting with others. I saw her as another child with a gift of imagination. But she soon became obnoxious with her stories and allowed them to take over her life. It made me fearful of having such stories in my head, like it was a possibility that I could make a mistake like that. It made me resent her, and her out of control mind.

Another thing that rubbed me the wrong way was that we both grew up in a similar manner. Briony was excessively sheltered. She lived in a little bubble of her own world. I too was a bit sheltered as a child. But unlike Briony, I was introduced to the world little by little. That way nothing was exposed too early and I was never overwhelmed. Briony’s sheltered world came crashing down all within a few hours. I guess I assumed she would be mature enough to handle it properly. I thought she would choose integrity over attention. It just goes to show that it is impossible hold others to your own expectations (quote Mr. Nigro).

There is one thing I will give her some slack on, the fact that she misunderstood the situation. She was not raised in the world to be desensitized to things. To see something and not just have a rock hard opinion of what it meant and instead think rationally using common sense. She is the perfect example of why some say eyewitnesses are sometimes unreliable. They make their own assumptions without knowing the situation. I also don’t understand everything people say or do in public settings (probably because of how I was raised), but I also know that I can’t assume anything about others.

All in all, I would just say Briony is complicated and human. And that definitely is something I can relate to. She made a mistake, she tried to atone for it, and she inflicts pain on herself through guilt. I do the same, but unlike Briony, I have people to turn to and help pull me out of it. That is probably why I turned out the way I am. I wonder how she would have turned out if she had someone to turn to when the guilt began to crush her.