In case we thought that Ender wouldn’t be any good at games, we get this reminder that um, yes, going to be quite good at games. (Here’s another hint: the book is called <em>Ender’s Game</em>, which is a title that really promises that Ender’s going to be OK at games.) But notice that this remark slips from talking about “the game” to talking about “the system.” What system is that? Is this thought about how Ender is pretty good at games or about how Ender has actually found a good place at the Battle School?

Ender gets a lot of attention in this book, so we can see pretty easily how he’s confined – there’s school, there’s the war, there are bullies, and family. All of those things limit Ender’s freedom. But what about the other characters? We have a good test case with Bernard: in order to preserve his freedom and happiness, Ender has to contain Bernard. It almost sounds as if there’s a limited quantity of freedom – the more Bernard has, the less Ender has; the less Bernard has, the more chance there is for other boys to be “free of him.”