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Symbolism In An Occurrence At Owl Creek

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Identify a theme in Bierce’s story. How does Bierce use symbolism and imagery to establish his message?
A main theme in An Occurrence at Owl Creek is that death is daunting. The main character is on the verge of death but his intense fear and denial for the situation causes him to hallucinate.
Most of the action in the story occurs in Farquhar’s head, and a repeated motivation that is mentioned multiple times throughout the story is his wife and children. The notion of family symbolizes comfort and safety for Farquhar, something he wants desperately while on the cusp of death. The intense, detailed imagery in Farquhar’s hallucinations furthers the thought that death is a horrible occurrence. The author shows a character unconsciously forming exhaustive and long hallucinations of his own escape from the situation in just a couple seconds because he is so scared of his fate.

Another theme in this story is the inability to tell the difference between reality and fantasy. The most obvious instance of this is when the reader is shown at the end of the story that all of Farquhar’s escape was just his imagination. This theme is pushed to the point that even the reader is not …show more content…

All conflict spawns from and occurs at the bridge. A micro setting in the story is the entrance to Farquhar’s house. This setting is introduced to the readers through a flashback after a cliffhanger. This flashback establishes the root of the primary conflict- Farquhar indicating to the scout that he was going to attempt to destroy the bridge, from which we can assume that Farquhar was caught. This micro setting is reason for the whole conflict- the execution, and the hallucination. The author’s choice of placing this flashback to this micro setting right after Farquhar is sent to his death causes the mood to become more suspenseful as the reader wishes to know what happened to

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