Killing Mr. Griffin

In the first chapters of Killing Mr. Griffin, Duncan highlights the stresses of high school on both teachers and students. She does so by utilizing characterization, internal conflict, external conflict, and foreshadowing.

These chapters introduce the reader to Jeff, Mark, Dave, Susan, and Betsy, five teenagers facing the stresses of high school. For all but Susan, their senior year is a formative final year before their lives change. Senior year transitions are highly stressful. Students face the possibilities of leaving their homes and families, the uncertainty of their future, and a loss of stable routine. Dave feels this pressure acutely because of his pressures from home to be successful. Dave doesn’t have the privilege of missing a beat in high school because his family’s future relies on his earning a scholarship to college. Other high school stresses immediately introduced in this novel are the anxieties tied to socializing, self-esteem, and peer pressure. These are illustrated through Susan as she is acutely aware of her lack of social status.

Perceived as a shy and odd nerd, Susan doesn’t have friends and is self-conscious about her looks. Her family’s good looks are juxtaposed to hers, though she is still a child and still developing. Susan is so smart that as a junior, she is taking a senior-level English class, but places more importance in her looks than in her intelligence as a measure of her self-worth. This explains why she readily agrees to kidnapping Mr. Griffin, even though such a plan is antithetical to the person she is. Susan is so eager to be accepted by the popular kids, particularly the handsome Dave, that she easily succumbs to peer pressure. The depiction of the pressures specific to the high school experience are crucial in developing a young adult novel. Duncan’s intended readers can better relate to characters that are engrossed in the same trials as they are.

Another relatable external conflict explored in these chapters is the fragile balance of power between student and teacher, teenager and adult. As a teenager, many adults control one’s life. Between guardians and teachers, teenagers have little autonomy, but have the growing desire to actively pursue their own desires. The structures set in place by adults make teenagers feel like passive spectators in their own lives. This is exemplified by the teenagers’ belief that Mr. Griffin is purposely out to get them.

Mr. Griffin’s strict classroom policies are in direct conflict with the many layers of the students’ lives, as well as their senses of self. Adults wield power because of their relative life experience, but these relationships of power are socially agreed upon, not necessarily indicative of a teenager’s preparedness to take on their lives on their own. The fallacy of the differentiated powers in relationships between young and older is apparent in the teacher-student dynamic. Students willingly give up a certain level of independence when they are a part of a school institution. In the case of the students versus Mr. Griffin, Mr. Griffin operates his classroom according to his own belief systems without meeting his students where they are. This engenders resentments between the students and Mr. Griffin. To the students, Mr. Griffin’s strictness and constant negative feedback feels oppressive, reductive, and performative. But the students necessarily give Mr. Griffin the power to dominate their grades and their self-esteem, because the power dynamics between teacher and student are socially agreed upon, not necessarily inherent. Because of this dynamic, when the students decide to exact revenge upon Mr. Griffin and assert their power, they do so with a misguided understanding of how to advocate for themselves.

Duncan immediately introduces tension in the first sentence of Chapter 1, in which an intention to kill Mr. Griffin is clearly outlined. Though the plan is to kidnap and scare Mr. Griffin, it is foreshadowed that something much worse will happen to him. This undercurrent of foreshadowed tension is heightened by Mark’s sociopathic characterization. Mark is described through the physical creepiness of his face; he is simultaneously blank-faced and hyperaware, impenetrable but always watching and analyzing others. When it is revealed that Mark set a cat on fire as a child, Duncan makes it clear that something is seriously wrong with Mark. Abuse of animals at the hands of children is a textbook example of sociopathic behavior. The not-so-subtle hints that Mark is capable of great violence heightens the danger Mr. Griffin is in. It is also notable that the plan to kidnap Mr. Griffin is Mark’s idea. He believes that respect is earned, and power is balanced through fear and intimidation. His friends agree to his plan in part because Mark exudes a confidence that seduces them into believing that such a bizarre plan can go well, without anyone getting hurt or in trouble. Furthermore, as teenagers in protected environments, Mark’s friends don’t have a clear sense of what justice can or should look like. Justice feels like scaring Mr. Griffin, but they don’t realize that logically, there are safer and more productive ways of getting what they need or want.

Another idea explored in these chapters is the issue of image versus reality. Dave’s image at school is one of aloof popularity in which everyone knows his name and face, but few people know the reality of his life at home. Dave keeps his pressures and his complicated family life a secret. His life is made more complex by his single mother and his grandmother who needs significant care. Dave doesn’t socialize as much as someone might expect, because he spends most of his hours outside of school helping with his grandmother and doing his homework. Dave is committed to his family, but he is weary of letting his peers know the extent of his problems. Similarly, Mr. Griffin is seen as a domineering and excessively mean teacher. Only his wife Cathy knows the softer side of him, or his intentions as a teacher. Mr. Griffin doesn’t approach his job with the intention of being cruel, even though his students perceive him in that light. Instead, he believes that structure and discipline will prepare his students for the difficult world outside of high school. He wants them to be confident to take on university work without folding. He appreciates his students more than they know, evidenced by his expressions of respect for Susan’s intellect. Cathy’s perceptions of Mr. Griffin reveal a different layer to his characterization, advocating for his character as more than just a primary antagonist. This new characterization also encourages a more sympathetic approach to Mr. Griffin’s character as his students plot a dangerous plan that will take him away from his pregnant and vulnerable wife.