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There is within me (and with sadness I have watched it in others) a knot of cruelty borne by the stream of love, much as our blood sometimes bears the seed of our destruction, and at times I was mean to Doodle.

The narrator admits he is sometimes mean to his younger brother. In this quote, he seems to defend himself by saying that his cruelty was “borne by the stream of love” he had for Doodle. This inner complexity shows up in the story when Brother makes Doodle touch the tiny coffin, and when he forces him to work harder than he is able in order to measure up to Brother’s arbitrary standards. The narrator may have convinced himself these actions were done out of love, but they are outwardly cruel.

Once I had succeeded in teaching Doodle to walk, I began to believe in my own infallibility and I prepared a terrific development program for him, unknown to Mama and Daddy, of course.

Here is a crucial turning point in the story, when Brother begins to believe that anything is possible for Doodle. This proves to be untrue, as the rigorous program of physical development ends in tragedy. But here is where we see the pride and arrogance of Brother, who uses Doodle’s initial success to push his brother even harder. He believes he is infallible, or incapable of doing wrong. The end of the story proves this assessment is tragically incorrect.

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