How to Train Your Dragon

Chan Kim

Cressida Cowell, born in April 1966, grew up in a small island around London. While
growing up she thought that dragons inhabited the island she lived in, and has been fascinated
by this mystical creatures ever since. As she became an adult, she attended Oxford to get her BA
in English Literature, and a MA in Narrative Illustration from Brighton. Cressida began writing
and illustrating eight books in her How to train Your Own Dragon in 2003. The book became
an instant hit as it was blended with humour and sublime prose. The book became published in
over 30 languages and even got a movie deal with DreamWorks Animation in 2010.

The book How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell is about a boy named Hiccup
who is the son of the viking chief. Someday he is supposed to take over his dads place, but he
lacks the qualities that make him a man. ( try to explain what dragon hunt is and its
importance). On the day of the dragon hunt, it was Hiccups chance to prove his worth. Led by
Gobber, Hiccup and his group climbed up a mountain and entered a cave full of sleeping baby
dragon. Hiccup managed to catch a dragon, but it wasnt the dragon he hoped for. Instead of
catching a dragon fit for a chiefs son, the baby dragon was smaller than average and had no
teeth around its mouth which was why he got dragon named as Toothless. But any dragon was
better than none, so he attempted to train toothless, even though he wasnt listening to him at all.
Thankfully with a talent Hiccup possessed, being able to communicate with Dragons,he was able
to speak to toothless and develop a new method to train his dragon. The time finally came and it
was time for rite of passage ( explains what it is and its importance) to begin. Everything was

going well until toothless offended one of the dragons,which eventually led to all dragons
fighting against one another. The Chief angered by what had occurred , stopped the event and
decided to exile every person that was participating in the rite of passage, including his son
Hiccup. Meanwhile, at shore two gigantic dragons appeared through the beach. One dragon in
particular, called the Green Death ,wanted to kill all the vikings in the island. While the vikings
were arguing to one another to defeat Green Death, the group ( who was this group ? Where
they vikings as well?) and hiccup went out on an expenditure to kill Green Death. With Hiccups
talent of speaking dragonese, he was able to successfully destroy Green Death by master
mindedly making it fight again another gigantic dragon, known as Purple Death. Hiccup and
Toothless were viewed as heroes for their bravery shown during the battle against Green Death.

The author Cressida Cowell explains in her book ,How to Train Your Dragon, that it
does not matter who you are because anyone can be a hero. She begins with a boy named Hiccup
who is weak and short compare to other vikings. Although he is the son of the chief, he still gets
bullied everyday, since he struggles to prove his worthiness to his community. However , he is
able to show true leadership and heroic qualities once he gets the chance to lead a group of
( Vikings? ,Dragons? to defeat the thing that was causing fear in his tribe. Instead of hiding away
from the issue or waiting for someone else to come up with their own solution, he took matters
into his own hands and became heroic.

When DreamWork film was creating a movie for How To Train Your Dragon, they
hired Chris Sanders and Dean Deblois as directors for the film. Chris Sanders and Dean Deblois
worked together with William Davies to make a screenplay for the film. Once the movie was

released in 2010, it was a big hit. They made $494,870,991 worldwide and $193,490,147 in
video sales. They also created another How to Train Your Dragon, but that is another story.

The movie How To Train Your Dragon directed by Chris Sanders and Dean BeBlois is
about a boy named Hiccup who is the son of the chief. ( too repetitive) He is relatively weak so
when there was a war between dragons and the vikings he was ordered to be inside fixing up
weapons, but one day he decided to prove his worthy and attempt to fight the dragons. His plan
failed dramatically until he saw night fury, the most dangerous and the most fastest dragon alive.
In desperation for glory he immediately gets his launcher and shoots it down. Hiccup tells
everyone in the village he had taken down the night fury, but no one believed that a kid like him
could bring down a dragon like night fury. The very next day he goes out to the woods to create a
map until he spots the night fury tangled with the trap he shot. Hiccup realized that if he brings
night fury to the village everything will be fixed, but when he tried to kill the night fury with a
knife he hesitated and let it go. This is when Hiccup realized that he wasnt born to kill dragons
so he went back home to tell his dad only to find out he was put into a dragon-fighting school. At
the same day he also meets night fury once again and realizes something strange about the
dragon, it couldnt fly. So Hiccup ended up trying to fix night fury, creating a bond with the
dragon. While he was handling night fury he also learned more about dragons so in school when
he had to face the dragon he easily beat them with no violence. Everyone was so impressed that
they cheered him on, but one girl name Astrid believed Hiccup is hiding something as she
noticed that Hiccup was acting suspicious. Eventually Hiccup tells Astrid the truth and shows the
dragon to her, telling her everything he has done so far. Furthermore, these two characters
somehow end up falling in love in a time span of just one day. During his final test in dragonfighting school, he has to kill a dragon, but Hiccup decides against and choses to convince his

people that dragons are actually friendly. His father , upset with Hiccup, leaves the school
immediately when he receives news that a dragon nest had been found. The dad quickly gets
ready to sail to the dragon nest, but once he reached their destination, he sees a huge dragon
which seems impossible to defeat. Thankfully Hiccup and his group of friends teams up with the
dragons to stop the huge dragon from killing the vikings. They end up slaying the huge dragon
making people realize dragons arent so bad, afterall. So Hiccups dad decides to invite the
dragons to their village to live in unision.

The director Chris Sanders and Dean BeBlois explains in their movie How to Train
Your Dragon that you should never judge a book by its cover. In the beginning, vikings believed
that dragons were an evil creature which must be whipped out of this world. Although its true
that some were evil most were kind, if shown respect. So when Hiccup discovered out that
dragons were not ,indeed, evil he tries to warn the vikings that dragons arent such nasty
creatures. Of course the vikings ignore him and later pay the consequences for it when a huge
dragon bursts out of the dragon nest to destroy mankind. The Vikings, having lost all hope, get
saved by Hiccup and his group with the help of the dragon. The vikings soon realize dragons
arent bad after all, resulting to inviting the dragons to live in their villages.
For this assignment I chose watched the movie first and then read the book.
When I was finished reading and watching the show it seemed the targeted audience were mostly
little boys. Additionally, the book differentiated a lot from the movie . In the book, a viking must
have a dragon to stay in a tribe, while in the movie the tribe has been fighting dragons all their
life until Hiccup shows how good dragons can be. They changed up the characters and even
added love scenes in the movie which the actual book does not include. But overall, both the
movie and the book were great.

The author Cressida Cowell believes that the movie was a great hit. Although the movie
and the book were very different, she thought the way they changed the theme of the movie
made it really powerful. For example when Hiccup lost his leg in the end, she was impressed as
how kids who are handicapped could now see a hero that is disabled like them up there on the
screen. In the end she loves the movie since she already knew that the movie wouldnt be exactly
the same, since wonderful books really are not wonderful movies meaning sometimes movies
need to change some parts of the book to create a wonderful movie.

The book and the movie How To Train Your Dragon are different. Some characters are
removed and new characters are put in the movie. For example they added Astrid to be Hiccups
love interest and removed Hiccup's best friend Camicazi to put some romance in Hiccups life to
spice up the story. The movie seems to change the theme of the story as well. In the book vikings
are training their dragons to own as a pets while in the movie the vikings are fighting against the
dragons. Although in both the movie there is a gigantic dragon that tries to destroy the village,
the way the gigantic monsters came to place is different. I believe they did this to put more action
behind it because what kind of kid doesnt want to watch vikings facing off with the dragons?
But one thing that was similar was the main character. Both the movie and the book made him
weak and a loser which later in the both storylines surprises everyone by becoming the hero of
the village.

While watching/reading How To Train Your Dragon I realize that Hiccup is a loser who
gets bullied by his fellow comrades because of his lack of manliness, but one day the village
encounters a fearsome dragon which Hiccup and his group bravely defeats, becoming the hero of

the village. This story How to Train Your Dragon can be related to humanities as Hiccup faced
a challenge and in the end, gained approval around him. We hear stories similar to this of heroes
facing obstacles during their journey with great rewards in the end. For example the movie
Kikis Delivery Service a young witch goes on a journey around the world by herself to
improve her witchcraft, but did not expect to feel out of place. Every girl around her was dressed
up nice while she only had a black dress which made her feel insecure, resulting in depression.
Soon enough she began losing her powers since she began doubting herself, but an obstacle
occurs with Tombo in danger which results in Kiki regaining her power as she believed she could
save him. The reward was her regaining her powers back. These stories create expectation of
obstacles in our life and others. We are sure that the journey we set in will be worth while,
bringing recognition and approval around us as we accomplish the big task. This is why we say
no pain, no gain because we know that in order to get something we must deserve it. This is
what gives life purpose as we hate to think life is just one thing after another with no purpose or
direction.

Cite:
Cowell, Cressida. How to Train Your Dragon. London: Hodder Children's, 2003. Print.
How to Train Your Dragon. Dir. Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois. Prod. Bonnie Arnold. Screenplay
by Will Davies. DreamWork Pictures, 2010. DVD.
Kiki's Delivery Service. Dir. Hayao Miyazaki. Studio Ghibli, 1989. DVD.
Janaro, Richard Paul., and Thelma C. Altshuler. The Art of Being Human: The Humanities as a
Technique for Living. New York: Harper & Row, 1984. Print.
"Cressida Cowell, Author of 'How To Train Your Dragon' Interview."Hollywood.com. N.p., 12 Oct.
2010. Web. 10 May 2016.
"Cressida Cowell." Famous Birthdays. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May 2016.