Literature and Writing Quotes in Speaker for the Dead

How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #4

[…] Ender was the Speaker for the Dead; his genius—or his curse—was his ability to conceive events as someone else saw them […] from the cold facts of Novinha's life he was able to guess—no, not to guess, to know—how her parent's death and virtual sainthood had isolated Novinha. (4.88)

Ender just about becomes the novelist here. How can he know from the facts who Novinha is unless he's not just interpreting, but writing her story? Is he learning what she is, or is he making her what she is?

Quote #5

But Miro had insisted on giving them, along with it, a printout of the Hive Queen and the Hegemon. "St. John says nothing about beings who live on other worlds," Miro pointed out. "But the Speaker for the Dead explains buggers to humans—and humans to buggers." …not a year later they found the piggies lighting fires using pages of St. John as kindling, while The Hive Queen and the Hegemon was tenderly wrapped in leaves. (9.122)

A big part of popular literature is identification; we like to be able to see ourselves in literature. The piggies are no different—which is another way of saying we can see ourselves in them seeing themselves in the Hive Queen. Literature is one way you bridge foreignness with sameness.

Quote #6

"Yes, you're ungrateful, and a terrible daughter," he said laughing softly. "Through all these years of chaos and neglect you've held your mother's family together with little help from her, and when you followed her in her career, she wouldn't share the most vital information with you….." (13.109)

The Speaker is speaking Ela's story—sort of a mini-speaking before the big event. What he says is also what the book says; we learn the truth about Ela from both simultaneously. Ender barely knows her, but he's nonetheless the voice of narrative authority. What the words say are what Ela is.