Captain Corellis Mandolin

Extract Essay: Corelli likes people (pages 242-245); Mandras likes ideals (pages 210-213) and the rest of the novel.
Throughout the novel Mandras is a character we see being nurtured by ideals from being an innocent handsome man who is a helpless admirer of our dear Pelagia, who turns into a ferocious fighter and ends up settling to be a communist. This is quite different to our protagonist Captain Antonio Corelli, who is a man that likes people for who they are, we see him develop by his experience in Cephallonia and becoming a gentleman suitable for Pelagia.
We see Corelli as an advisor in this short section as well as in the novel as a whole. In this extract the captain is joined by Gunter Weber, who is a young leader in the German army in Cephallonia. Corelli “unknitted the dry bones in his heart”, which shows he is making Weber happy. The fact that Corelli “unknitted” the dry bones, shows that the German did have a sense of depression in him, and this was a complex state of mind as it needed to be “unknitted”, as knitting suggests a complex structure which is delicate. Also, the image of “unknitting the dry bones in his heart” gives the readers the sense of a medical image which reminds the readers of Dr Iannis and his prevails in chapter one.   This highlights Corelli doing good things for people, which link in to the aspect of a doctor, who also does good things for people by making them feel better.
Corelli is also a very caring man, as we see through his actions throughout the novel. His passion for treating women the way he feels they should be, which is like that of man being a gentleman, is one of Corelli’s main ways of showing his care and affection. When he sees Pelagia, he refers to her as “Kyria Pelagia”, which is a caring term with a hint of affection towards Pelagia. We also see his care, through his thoughts about sleeping in Pelagia’s bed, and his worry and guilt of making Pelagia sleep on the kitchen floor. He also ponders about when he...