“It’s funny, but you never think much about breathing. Until it’s all you think about.” Tim Winton’s engaging novel “Breath” entertained an adolescent audience through reliving the journey of Bruce Pike's teenage years. The audience was encouraged to experience and visualise Bruce's journey of self-discovery and exploration. Winton explored how a young boy connected with nature whilst pushing himself to find just how far one breath could take him resulting in Bruce thinking about the value which one breath can uphold. Winton left his audience feeling breathless, adventurous, mischievous and at some point lost and sad; just like the character, “Pikelet”. Told from the point of view of a middle aged divorced man reflecting upon his life, Winton used the techniques of a strong vocabulary, flashbacks descriptive language and symbolism to tell the story of Pikelet’s …show more content…
Loonie was seen as a bad influence in the eyes of Pikelets parents, the son of a local publican in a small mill town of Sawyer. Winton expressed Loonie to the audience as an action before thoughts kind of kid. With the disapproval of Pikelets parents, the two boys developed and inseparable friendship whilst being each other’s biggest competitor. Winton engaged the audience in the boy’s adventures at the dreary brown river with them holding their breaths until they saw stars. Diving down to the bottom of the freezing river to hold onto slimy tree roots until their breaths were pushed to the max, this was done all day scaring people and pushing each other to the ultimate. Winton left the audience with a typical sense of pictures, two normal country teenage boys, he began to introduce the adrenaline rushing adventures which Bruce will be making whilst finding himself and connecting with