Symbolism In Between Shades Of Gray By Ruta Sepetys

In the book Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys, theme was often showed through symbolism. One of the themes in the story was having hope even when you think there’s nothing left to hope for. This theme was everywhere in the book, because it was showed through symbolism most of the time. For example, in the beginning of Lina’s journey, Andrius finds a gemstone outside one day. He brought it back to train car and passed it around to everyone. The gemstone brought hope and a smile back to everyone. Andrius later gave the stone to Lina to give her strength. However, that’s not the end of the stone’s travels Lina later on in the story gave the stone to Jonas (her brother) when he falls ill at the beet farm. Jonas thankfully ends up recovering,

He begins to feel that Andrius needs hope and something lucky as well, so he hands it off to him. Finally, when Andrius and Lina are being seperated, Andrius slips the stone into her pocket. He knows that wherever Lina was going, she was going to need all the hope she could get. Lina and her family end up at the top of the Arctic Circle and the conditions are horrible. One of the only things that got her through it was the gem. It gave her hope that she would one day make it back to Andrius and be happy again. That simple little stone ended up being one of the only things helping Lina and the ones she loves get through a hard time. It was a symbol of hope. Another important piece of symbolism the author added was Lina’s parents wedding rings. These helped show a smaller theme: that family is more important than anything. In the beginning of the story Lina, her mom, and Jonas are put in a group, but without her father. She has no idea where he is, so one night she, Jonas, and Andrius go looking for him. They find their dad in a different group, and he gives Lina his wedding ring. He knows that giving up his ring means that Lina’s mother will have more money to