In Ellen Raskin's The Westing Game, we learn most
of the physical descriptions of Samuel W.
Westing early on in the novel when Turtle, youngest
daughter of Jake and Grace Wexler, reads the obituary in the
newspaper after having run screaming from the Westing house.
One thing we know about Samuel W. Westing from reading the
obituary is that he was found dead at the age of 65, in his
lakeside Westingtown mansion, after having disappeared for 13 years (p. 21). We
also know he liked to dress up in costumes during his annual
gala 4th of July celebration and went disguised as Ben Franklin, Uncle Sam, a
drummer boy, and even Betsy Ross (p. 22). A couple of pages further, we learn
that Turtle ran screaming from the Westing house because she was the one to
find him dead in his "four-poster" bed; she had also found an envelope on his
bedside table on which he had scrawled the words "If I am found dead in bed."
The narrator further describes, "Through her scream she had seen the
white-bearded face" (p. 23-24). Hence, we know that not only was he
65 when he died, he also had a white
beard.
Other than those details though, it can be said that author Raskin
relied more heavily on describing Westing using indirect
characterization rather than direct. Indirect
characterization happens when an author reveals information about the
character through the character's actions, things the character says, and other
characters' responses to the character. In contrast, direct
characterization is when an author relays information about the
character using very vivid and often physical descriptions. Read Write
Think, associated with the National Council of
Teachers of English, gives us the following example of direct
characterization: "The patient boy and quiet girl were both well
mannered and did not disobey their mother" ("Defining
Characterization").
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