The Westing Game

At the beginning of The Westing Game, the characters seem to fit into clear social categories, but these “types” quickly prove to be deceptive. Through revealing the gap between appearances and reality, the novel not only explores prejudices of various sorts but also comments on human psychology and the multitudes it can contain.

For example, characters like Denton and Sydelle at first believe that Chris’s physical disability corresponds to an intellectual disability. This is, of course, not true, and via the omniscient narration, the reader is cued into his complex thought processes on numerous occasions. For instance, Chris is thrilled at being taken for a criminal precisely because it means that people’s estimations of him have exceeded their normal ways of thinking about him. Similarly, Angela is constantly taken for, as Sydelle says, “beautiful and well-loved” by both those who know her and those who don’t (49). By the end of the book, not only has she redefined herself as someone other than Denton’s fiancée but she has become a surgeon, proving her intelligence and work ethic.

Other characters’ misconceptions primarily concern themselves, leading to comedic mismatches between who they perceive themselves to be and who they in fact are.