How Does Stanley Change In The Book Holes?

Question

Stanley's journey from bullied zero to hero at Camp Green Lake felt so satisfying. Watching his confidence grow through all the adversity made the book.

kvalletta2017 · Answer

As the story begins, Stanley is depicted as a rather passive, yet unlucky kid. But as he struggles to survive at Camp Green Lake, and discovers true friendship with Zero, he grows into a confident young boy, eventually taking control of his own life. The way Stanley grows into a strong boy through his many struggles is fantastic. I recently finished reading ‘The Stranger He Became’ and the way the main character trudges through life while trying to discover who he is after waking up from a coma with no memory, and having everyone, including his wife, think he’s an impostor is fascinating. The constant psychological tension is really amazing.

Ryder · Answer

It's really nice to see how slowly Stanley grew up in 'Holes'. He was this really awkward, sorry-to-be-there kind of kid when he first went to Summer Camp, and even the other boys at camp started to tease him and call him 'Caveman', (although that would be ironic later, as he would literally be carrying around the Zero Caveman in a hole-digging kind of primitive fashion). But with extreme heat and exhaustion, something finally click for Stanley and he started to grow up. Note that his growth was based off of his choices, like how he defended Zero from the Warden. In those choices he discovered the value of another person's life over his own comforts.

What is also brilliant is that his physical journey is mirrored by his emotional one. He is digging holes in the desert which corresponds with the “holes” in his self-esteem. But he fills the holes, thanks to Zero, and grows as a person. Even the metaphor of an onion is perfect – he has many layers of toughness and many layers of vulnerability, but in the end he grows up and becomes a better person. He no longer is the victim, instead he has rewritten his life in a very positive way and can now walk with his head held high digging up truths (literally and figuratively).

Hattie · Answer

Stanley in ‘Holes’ by Louis Sachar is an excellent example of a subtle change in a character throughout a story. When Stanley first arrives at Camp Green Lake he is very passive and blames his ‘no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing’ ancestor for his misfortunes. But slowly as Stanley is physically broken down at the camp he is emotionally built up. This occurs through the many holes he has to dig and the monotonous routine he goes through each day. Stanley’s relationship with Zero also reflects his development from a very dependent person to someone who can carry another person on his back up a mountain.

Stanley can also leave because he finally understands the Yelnats family curse and how it affected previous generations of his family. Instead of feeling helpless before the enormous ‘luck’ bestowed upon his ancestors, he realizes that he had to work to uncover the truth about the treasure that disappeared in the 19th century and to be fair to Hector Zeroni, the son of a boot-heeled fibber and a witch. By the time that he leaves Camp Green Lake for good, the Stanley is luckier, but wiser. Even tiny details of the boy such as the hardening of his palms or the ceasing of his flinching at the sound of the Warden’s voice portray a boy of great resiliency and growth.

Violette · Answer

I just finished re-reading ‘Holes’ by Louis Sachar and the most remarkable change in a character has to be Stanley. At the beginning of the book, Stanley is a somewhat unsuccessful kid who believes that he’s had bad luck because of a family curse. He’s rather fat and frequently bullied, and rather accepts his circumstances. But as he is forced to dig at Camp Green Lake, he grows. A lot. Through his friendships with Kids like Zero, he learns about loyalty, courage, etc. But he’s also physically changed: he’s grown a lot, and has gained a lot of confidence. Even his family’s curse is portrayed differently towards the end of the book, and it’s almost as if he’s re-writing a piece of his family’s past. His journey to uncover the truth about Camp Green Lake, and about the legend of the elusive treasure of Kissin’ Kate Barlow is a fascinating and satisfying one, and ties in really well with Stanley’s growth as a character.

Cindy Chen · Answer

This is an interesting perspective on how Stanley perceives “hard work” in the novel. When he is first at Camp Green Lake digging holes for no reason, that is hard labor. But as he grows and develops physically and mentally, he is able to work very hard at things like teaching Zero how to survive and even to rescue from harm. Carrying Zero up the mountain to save his life is the hardest work that Stanley does in the novel, and it has a very meaningful purpose. He can distinguish between meaningless drudgery and very hard work that is very significant. I think this growth in how he perceives work is really important and a huge part of Stanley’s growth as a character. He learns to be able to put his absolute utmost effort towards whatever end he believes in, and I think that that kind of work ethic will serve him well long after Camp Green Lake.

wainguiller · Answer

As Stanley transitions from boyhood to the maturity of a self-authoring individual, his sense of identity solidifies. In the beginning of the story, Stanley identifies himself by the string of misfortunes that plague him as “the one with bad luck,” “the fat kid,” or “the one on trial.” At camp, he develops an external identity of “Caveman.” However, after being given this external identity, Stanley earns it by developing into a tough and capable youth. When choosing his identity as Stanley the teacher, Stanley the friend, and Stanley the survivor of the curse, he integrates these attributes into a sense of self that defines him as Stanley, the Yelnats who ended the curse of bad luck that had followed his family for generations. The boy who had an identity imposed upon him by circumstance becomes a man who has developed his own sense of identity through his actions.

Dan Griffon Sr · Answer

He starts to notice things around him, like the guards’ routines, the relationships of the other boys at the camp, and the landscape around him. He notices the Warden’s nail polish and makes the connection to the lipstick tube he found in the tunnel. He even notices a rock formation that looks just like a thumb. He starts to notice how bad Zero is getting. He becomes a detective in his own life trying to make sense of things and this is the beginning of him taking control. Once a person who was watched and judged by everyone at the camp, he becomes someone who watches and analyzes people and things in order to use that information to his advantage and rise above his present circumstances. Knowledge becomes power.

Bebi Giroveanu · Answer

This name gimmick is pretty cute, but it reinforces his character development too. His character development is about returning to the beginning of his life as a different boy. He returns to his family but not as the boy he was before. He returns to a world that wrongly accused him of a crime but now he has the power to clear his name for that wrong. This curse is a matter of paying off a debt from the past and thus can be resolved in the present to move on. So the lessons he learns from past events (about the history of Green Lake and his ancestor’s promise) are how he can change to grow up into a new, different future. But although his name is a palindrome his character is not static and he uses his circular journey to leave a cycle of events behind and start a new straight line.

Cesar Mendieta · Answer

This is so great. I've been mulling over the last line of the book which is "He could smell the sweet odor of peach syrup." His dad finally succeeded at something. That smell which had seemed to represent failure and poverty in the past now is a symbol of success, of home, of a weight having been lifted from the Millers. All of this was made possible by Stanley's journey to become stronger than he had been at the beginning of the book. Not only had he become stronger than when he had started but he had also become stronger than any of his ancestors. He carried the weight of generations up that mountain and the sweet smell of the peach syrup that his dad had worked so hard to perfect is the proof that the world has changed because of Stanley's growth. It's not a proud declaration by any means but rather a simple sweet smell that signifies that everything is different now.

Ghandi Ganapathy · Answer

One thing I loved so much about how this boy grew was his confidence in so many ways. At the beginning of the story he is SO afraid of the Warden, of Mr. Sir, even of some of the other boys in the concentration camp where he has been sent. He only speaks when he is spoken to. But after he and Zero spend time in the desert together he returns to the camp with a completely new demeanor. Right away he begins to negotiate. Zero gets the first drink of water, for example. And then in the scene where the Warden tries to take the suitcase that this boy has packed for his journey home, the Warden can’t. The boy has grown so much in his sense of justice and his understanding of right and wrong. What he and Zero experienced in the desert was so much greater than the little tyranny they were living in at the camp, and he has grown to realize that. He is no longer the boy who would blindly go along with a wrongful conviction of himself. This boy has grown up so much and it is incredible to read. Instead of being a passive accepter of authority this boy has become a critical evaluator of it. He uses the system (the attorney general, news of his story) against them. I think this is an incredible intellectual and moral leap for a kid to have made from the boy we meet at the beginning of the story.

Cristina Ridzna SK · Answer

Even more beautiful are the little actions which show the huge change within Stan. When he first arrives, he’s intimidated by Mr. Sir. By the end, Stan catches the sunflower seed bag that Mr. Sir throws at him without so much as flinching. His vocabulary changes too. Instead of calling the other boys by their nicknames, he now refers to them by their full names as Hector Zeroni. The Warden, once almost revered by Stan, is no longer seen as legitimate. Even the way that Stan walks has changed. We see him trudging along when he’s walking into camp, but when he’s leaving with his suitcase, he’s striding along purposefully. And there’s the laughter – loud and carefree, unlike the laughter we see earlier in the book. Sachar does a beautiful job of illustrating this huge change within Stan, a change that is manifested through his actions. We don’t need to read some long, in depth speech to realize that he’s changed – we can clearly see the change through the way that he holds himself, interacts with others, and even takes control of small situations.

How Does Stanley Change In The Book Holes?

11 Answers

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