Bily teaches writing and literature at Adrian College in Adrian, Michigan. In this essay, Bily examines the motif of the doppelgänger in Cormier's novel.

When Robert Cormier published The Chocolate War in 1974, and then I Am the Cheese in 1977, he was heralded (and scolded) for being part of a new trend in literature. This movement, which came to be known as new realism, was in fact new in many ways: it depicted life the way it really is for many people, with its struggles as well as its joys, and it presented issues and ideas that had not been offered specifically to young readers before.

But like all literature that seems bound to last, I Am the Cheese was not entirely new. Literature is a conversation across the centuries and across cultural borders, and many of the ideas and motifs that most resonate with readers...