The Tiger's Wife Analysis

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The last piece of literature I read was the novel called, “The Tiger’s Wife” by Téa Obreht. It is a 337 page literary fiction, involving magical realism, politics, and supernatural themes. I read this book for English class and it took me about one month to read. Although this is true, if I had time to read it without making annotations and journal entries, it would have taken only one day to read.The novel includes four important characters: Natalia, Natalia’s grandfather, the tiger’s wife, and Gavran Gailé. Natalia is the protagonist, a doctor trying to find the truth about her grandfather’s lies and stories. This story involves the memories of her grandfather, a late doctor who passed away due to cancer. Over his lifetime, he has met multiple …show more content…

These include individuals moving past the impacts of the war, the death of a lover and the death of one’s family members. The theme of overcoming death and loss reinforces popular notions of life as people continue to grieve and lose their will to live when their loved ones die. Characters must continue to live their life as they must try to move on and overcome their loss. The death of someone shouldn’t be forgotten, but individuals must learn to live without those who passed away as they face reality. These emotions are demonstrated by the characters such as Natalia are emphasized as their journey ends by accepting the death of their loved ones. Another message found within the story is the meaning behind the tiger’s wife and her relationship with the tiger. The negative ideologies that the citizens have internalized portrays how war and conflict intensifies prejudice and discrimination. As the citizens are living in fear and anger, they take this out on something they can control, which in this case is the tiger’s wife. This was an interesting as the readers can understand the author’s opinion on war. As it is set in the former Yugoslavia, where the author was born and raised until the age of 7, readers can understand her political views on the Balkan and Croatian