Demon Copperhead

Demon Copperhead

by

Barbara Kingsolver

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Demon Copperhead makes teaching easy.

Tommy Waddell Character Analysis

Tommy is one of the foster boys whom Demon meets at Mr. Crickson’s farm. The novel portrays Tommy as a sweet, kind, caring, and gentle person. Demon loses contact with Tommy for a while, but when the two reconnect, Tommy is working at the local newspaper. Tommy remembers the comics Demon would draw on the farm, and the two of them begin to work on a weekly comic for the newspaper.

Tommy Waddell Quotes in Demon Copperhead

The Demon Copperhead quotes below are all either spoken by Tommy Waddell or refer to Tommy Waddell. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Exploitation Theme Icon
).
Chapter 10 Quotes

A ten-year-old getting high on pills. Foolish children. This is what we’re meant to say: Look at their choices, leading to a life of ruin. But lives are getting lived right now, this hour, down in the dirty cracks between the toothbrushued nighty-nights and the full grocery carts, where those words don’t pertain. Children, choices. Ruin, that was the labor and materials we were given to work with. An older boy that never knew safety himself, trying to make us feel safe. We had the moon in the window to smile on us for a minute and tell us the world was ours. Because all the adults had gone off somewhere and left everything in our hands.

Related Characters: Demon Copperhead (speaker), Demon’s Mom , Fast Forward, Dori, Tommy Waddell, Mr. Crickson, Swap-Out
Page Number: 77
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 11 Quotes

She asked me about Creaky Farm, and I told her. The old man was brutal to Tommy, and Swap-Out should be in some other kind of situation […]. Had Crickson ever hit me, she asked. Answer: no. I myself had not been struck. And that was that. Miss Barks was sorry, but Tommy and Swap-Out weren’t on her. Usually all kids in a home are from one foster company, but Crickson was an emergency-type place, and Tommy and Swap-Out belonged to a different foster company that Miss Bark didn’t work with. So fostering was done by companies, and we, as Stoner would say, were Product. Rotating and merchandising foster boys at more than fifty customer accounts. Live and learn.

Related Characters: Demon Copperhead (speaker), Tommy Waddell, Miss Barks, Mr. Crickson, Swap-Out
Related Symbols: Opioid Painkillers
Page Number: 78
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 49 Quotes

I tried to explain the whole human-being aspect of everybody needing to dump on somebody. Stepdad smacks mom, mom yells at the kid, kid finds the dog and kicks it. (Not that we had one. I wrecked some havoc on my Transformers though.) We’re the dog of America. Every make of person now has their proper nouns, except for some reason, us. Hicks, rednecks, not capitalized.

Related Characters: Demon Copperhead (speaker), Demon’s Mom , Tommy Waddell
Page Number: 417
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Demon Copperhead LitChart as a printable PDF.
Demon Copperhead PDF

Tommy Waddell Quotes in Demon Copperhead

The Demon Copperhead quotes below are all either spoken by Tommy Waddell or refer to Tommy Waddell. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Exploitation Theme Icon
).
Chapter 10 Quotes

A ten-year-old getting high on pills. Foolish children. This is what we’re meant to say: Look at their choices, leading to a life of ruin. But lives are getting lived right now, this hour, down in the dirty cracks between the toothbrushued nighty-nights and the full grocery carts, where those words don’t pertain. Children, choices. Ruin, that was the labor and materials we were given to work with. An older boy that never knew safety himself, trying to make us feel safe. We had the moon in the window to smile on us for a minute and tell us the world was ours. Because all the adults had gone off somewhere and left everything in our hands.

Related Characters: Demon Copperhead (speaker), Demon’s Mom , Fast Forward, Dori, Tommy Waddell, Mr. Crickson, Swap-Out
Page Number: 77
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 11 Quotes

She asked me about Creaky Farm, and I told her. The old man was brutal to Tommy, and Swap-Out should be in some other kind of situation […]. Had Crickson ever hit me, she asked. Answer: no. I myself had not been struck. And that was that. Miss Barks was sorry, but Tommy and Swap-Out weren’t on her. Usually all kids in a home are from one foster company, but Crickson was an emergency-type place, and Tommy and Swap-Out belonged to a different foster company that Miss Bark didn’t work with. So fostering was done by companies, and we, as Stoner would say, were Product. Rotating and merchandising foster boys at more than fifty customer accounts. Live and learn.

Related Characters: Demon Copperhead (speaker), Tommy Waddell, Miss Barks, Mr. Crickson, Swap-Out
Related Symbols: Opioid Painkillers
Page Number: 78
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 49 Quotes

I tried to explain the whole human-being aspect of everybody needing to dump on somebody. Stepdad smacks mom, mom yells at the kid, kid finds the dog and kicks it. (Not that we had one. I wrecked some havoc on my Transformers though.) We’re the dog of America. Every make of person now has their proper nouns, except for some reason, us. Hicks, rednecks, not capitalized.

Related Characters: Demon Copperhead (speaker), Demon’s Mom , Tommy Waddell
Page Number: 417
Explanation and Analysis: