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Symbolism In 'Janus And The Boat'

646 Words3 Pages

Everyone has objects and items in their life that hold a deeper meaning to them than what meets the eye. These objects often insignificant to everyone else means so much to you. These pieces symbolize to much more than just the items is itself. They hold memories of your past, current ideas, or insight of the future, and some may symbolize so much more. In the short stories “Janus” and “The Boat”, the authors explore the use of symbolism to give deeper insight into the lives of the protagonists.

Beattie used a bowl to symbolically to represent Andreas life. Andrea a real estate agent seemingly has a normal life at first but as the bowl gets introduced to the reader and the story progresses we learn so much more about her two-faced life. The bowl represents her affair with her lover. He got the bowl for her. It also shows …show more content…

A tight-knit family in a small fishing village in Nova Scotia. Their boat is named after the maiden name of the narrators mother Jenny Lynn. It follows the traditions of that community as the other fishing boats are also named after female members of the each family respectively. This is one of the symbols the boat has. The mother as well is the most devoted character to the traditions of the fishing village compared to the rest of the family. The boat is a symbol of duty that the mother feels she has, has it is her maiden not her current one the boat is named after, which furthers this feeling of duty to preserve the fishing traditions that her ancestors once started. At the end of the story the farther goes missing of the back of the boat as they returned home during a storm. It is not stated in the story but a bit implied to the reader that the father committed suicide to give his son the freedom to further his education as he would no longer feel the obligation to work with his farther on the boat has he is no-longer

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By using similes, symbolism, and parallelism, the author uses fly fishing to represent the cycle of life. During the story, Maclean uses various similes to compare the river with life and family. For example, he shared with the audience that the “common love for the river would bring them back as a family.” This shows how sacred the river is to every man in the Maclean

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Symbolism can also be used to represent complex emotions and experiences the authors would find difficult to express only through words. Storms, for example, can deepen the idea of turmoil in one’s life. Along with that, symbolism creates powerful images, capturing the reader’s attention with memorable images all while highlighting the most important themes for the author to further help convey the message and main idea of the essay. For example, the continuous use of the gate as a symbol of

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“She seemed to always be repairing clothes that were ‘torn in the boat’ preparing food ‘to be eaten in the boat’ or looking for ‘the boat’ in our kitchen window which faced upon the sea (Macleod 3). Their life only revolved around the boat. Whenever father returned from work that’s what was always talked about, the boat. Another quote that set the mood of the story is when the narrator talks about his mother. He says: “My mother was of the sea, as were all of her people, and her horizon were the very literal ones she scanned with her dark fearless eyes” (Macleod 6).

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What seemed to be the biggest bass in the river, snagged on the line. There is no way the boy could let Sheila know of this. The rest of the night, the narrator maneuvers the boat perfectly and somehow manages to keep the fish on the line, without Sheila having any knowledge. They finally reach their destination and the boy is faced with a crippling decision. The boy has to either cut the line, letting the fish go, or risk having Sheila lose all interest in him by reeling in the fish.

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1142 Words | 5 Pages

The Boat shows the audience the burdensome process of the protagonist choosing whether defers to carry on the family's tradition of fishery or follows his own heart and get an education. The plot of the story develops through the internal conflict of the protagonist with his own maturity. In the protagonist's youth, he views life in a state of innocence without consideration of his duty as the only son. As he grows up, he gets to know that his father’s desire to attend university was thwarted out of his responsibilities to support the whole family as the protagonist says:''... I thought it was very much braver to spend a life doing what you really do not want rather than selfishly following forever your own dreams and inclinations.''

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Symbolism allows the author to create a story that would otherwise be bland and monotone. Without this dark romantic element, books, short stories, and poems would not have as much meaning nor appealing detail. Symbolism in "The Raven," "The Devil and Tom Walker," and "The Minister's Black Veil," creates layers of meaning and interesting characters. Symbolism has been used for centuries to spice up the literary world. Sometimes it is used in obvious ways, but other time it has to be thoroughly studied to be imperturbably understood.

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Symbolism is a standout amongst the most vital scholarly terms utilized frequently by numerous authors to pass on their focal thought. As indicated by the Longman Contemporary Dictionary, Symbolism can be characterized as a gadget that brings out more than an exacting importance from a man, question, picture or word. Symbolism plays a big factor in this story. The significance of Mrs. Moore trip with the kids to FAO Schwartz is caught in Bambara's utilization of Symbolism. The youngsters took a gander at various elite toys outside the store.

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In both The Lord of the Flies and Frankenstein there are monsters. Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" and William Golding's "Lord Of The Flies" both portray 'the evil in man', the inherent nature of man, and different types of effects caused by society reasons, eventually leading the beast to emerge. These themes are portrayed in various ways in the two books. I will be comparing and contrasting, which novel best exposes the monsters found within?

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In The Boat the author uses the roll of money as a symbol of hope for Mai, “her mother had hooked her fingers under her waistband and handed her a damp roll of money”. Mai’s mother had hope for her future by handing her the roll of money, which was also a symbol of hope that they would make it to their destination. Another symbol of hope is Truong, his singing is the driving force that gives Mai hope. The Road also uses symbols to relate to the theme hope. “The fire” is a symbol of hope in the road, it gives light and warmth is a guide of how to live and it designates the difference between the cannibals who have no hope and people that “keep carrying the fire”.

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As the father and son journey toward the coast, they encounter numerous challenges and dangers, but they also find moments of beauty and wonder amid the desolation. One such moment occurs when the father reflects on the past, lamenting the loss of the world as it once was: "Once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow" (McCarthy 286). The brook trout described in the passage symbolizes the beauty and wonder of a world that has been irreversibly altered. The brook trout, with its "vermiculate patterns" and "maps and mazes," can be seen as a metaphor for the characters' journeys of self-discovery and resistance.

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The author’s choices of symbolism, frame story, and characterization greatly impact the meaning of the story. Symbolism immensely impacts the meaning of the story. The use of metaphors and symbolism forces the reader to think critically about the meaning of the story. One example of symbolism in

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He confronts internal conflict in the story when he mounts the rod in the boat. The narrator is getting ready for his date with Sheila in the middle of the story, when he “mounted his Mitchell reel on his(made changes to quote) Pflueger spinning reel rod and stuck it in the stern”.(Wetherell 2) The narrator crosses paths with internal conflict as he puts the rod in the boat, allowing for the possibility of getting the bass on his line and causing conflict with Sheila's dislike for fishing. Along with his love of fishing. The narrator also encounters internal conflict when Sheila brings up Eric Caswell.

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535 Words | 3 Pages

The boat is described as a “black mass” with the only light being the “illuminated potholes”. The complexity being that the reader would believe that the boat that would ultimately lead to her freedom would be described in a brighter connotation, or at the very least, be described as a boat rather than a mass. When the negatively connotated boat is described in the short story, that is when Eveline reconsiders going on the boat with Frank. This boat could be a recall of her trauma and ultimately what makes Eveline feel like this new life will not help her stray from her trauma and further elaborate that she wants to stay back in the home where she can relate to the happiness she has felt before. Furthermore, she does not feel any guilt about staying without going with John, because she was in love with the idea that Frank could offer her rather than the idea of John, as she “gave him no sign of love or farewell” when she left him at the

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Many people face conflict in their life; but not many people can say they have found the “pearl of the world” or survived multiple attacks from mysterious evils. In the story The Pearl by John Steinbeck, Kino and his family face many conflicts while trying to protect the pearl from the evil that lurks in the darkness. By showing symbolism, using description, and by informing the reader more than the characters, Steinbeck is able to show the struggle between good and evil. John Steinbeck uses symbolism to represent the conflict Kino is facing, while trying to protect the pearl against the greed of the people attempting to take it from him. For example, Kino has a canoe that he uses to get clams and fish, but it’s more than just a canoe.

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There are many whales in the sea, but this particular whale called Moby Dick is the desirable catch for the whalers and captain due to its legendary proportions. In the novel, Moby Dick, it offers an allegorical story of humanity’s dangerous search for meaning. The monstrous, white whale represents that “meaning” humans have been hunting for their entire lives, but at the end one will discover that one can do so much but still end up not finding their answer. The entire plot to Moby Dick is directed towards the final confrontation between Ahab, his crewman and the White whale. At the end, the whale wins the fight and the rest of the crew on ship all die, demonstrating the fact that the whale cannot be defeated, hence signaling how the laws

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