Analysis Of Alistair Macleod 's ' The Boat, And The Lost Salt Gift Of Blood '

The exposition of Blood on the River by Elisa Carbone is when a boy called Samuel Collier stole his mother's locket from a pan shop and the owner found him and sent him to an orphanage. This novel has many different settings in the beginning of the book they are in England, then in the middle of the book the are on a boat on there way to the “New World”. Then in the middle /end of the book they are in Jamestown Virginia. The time period that this book took place in is 1606-1607. The significant event that happened in this time period was the creation of Jamestown. There were many people involved in this such as Samuel, Captain Smith, Captain Ratcliff, and many other gentlemen and peasants. The problem that they face are dealing with the Native American people and just trying to survive. This is a problem because the natives don't want these people around so they try to get rid of them, and survival is a problem because they are in a new place that they have never been in before and they dont know whats poisonous or how to really protect themselves because most of the people they brought were gentlemen.

When the Macleans, especially Norman speaks of the river they are also referring to life, their lives, and themselves. When Norman couldn't

The narrator remembers his father with cracked lips "that bled when he smiled…"(138),  and his arms with open wounds that never heal. These wounds were inflicted by the salty water of the sea and the sun. The father's body  "[has] never been intended for a fisherman…"(138), neither was his mind. The life that the father wanted to live was far from the fisherman's life. The names of the books, magazines and writers are also mentioned to allude the real father's passion, which is literature.

The Native Canadian culture revolves around the art of storytelling, and this natural gift is heredity. In Story of Starvation, by Marion Tuu’luq, she tells a tale of her childhood where she and her people go on a journey to find food. They are driven to the brink of starvation due to their lack of technology, and their practice of hunting for their own meals. Tuu’luq’s intense story shows the significance of the Native Canadian way of life, and the tough childhoods that many of them had to endure. Tuu’luq says in her story, “I am going to recount a story that I am sure I have told over and over again in the past” (Pg. 86). This repetition of the story shows the cultural impact of storytelling in the Aborigine community. This story truly does control Tuu’luq’s life, because she retells it in order to remember all that she had to face within her childhood in order to survive. The story is both a source of entertainment, and a source of historical prevalence in Tuu’luq’s life. Although, it was a horrid experience, she learns to cope with it and tell it in a way where the listener takes away the importance of remembering Native Canadian

The short story “The Boat” by Alistair MacLeod is narrated by a man who comes from a fishing family. His mother’s side of the family has forever lived and worked by the sea and continues this tradition. The narrator’s father always wanted to be an academic, but worked on the boat to support his family. Through this passage it is evident that the parents’ characters clash in many aspects of their lives and are in constant conflict. MacLeod demonstrates this through the use of repetition, the contrast in other unrelated ideas, and through information that is withheld.

In addition to this, belonging to a family is a key concept in this novel. The novel opens with an alluring introduction to the family; a blissful atmosphere is created through the picturesque icons of their family life. The composer uses small photograph like icons to allude towards the widely acknowledged contentment that is readily associated with the memories in a picture album. Tan introduces the motif of the paper crane which he carries through the length of his novel as a symbol of affection and belonging between the family members. The next pages signify the break in contentment as the man begins his journey and a salient image of the couple with their hands grasping the other’s parallels the anxiety and despair in their downcast facial expressions. Although the gloomy atmosphere, the light sepia tones in the picture allow an insight into the tender and loving relationship that the family members share. Upon the man’s departure the paper crane motif returns and he hands it to his daughter as a token of his undying love for her. His migratory experience is studded by the comfort and ease that he obtains from a picture of his family. In paralleled scenes on the boat and the new apartment, the

While winning an arm wrestling match with his father, Manning feels the same thrill as hooking a giant fish. But he decides he would be happier if he “let him go, cut the line, keep the legend alive.” Reference of the father as a big fish stresses his physical and spiritual prominence. By referring to him as a “legend,” Manning clearly shows his awe and admiration for his father and his authorities as a guardian of the family. Though his father is growing weak, his former presence as a protective father will always remain as his legend. The reference to the big fish can also relate to Daniel Wallace’s Big Fish. The novel is similar with Manning’s story in that it is about a father-and-son relationship where Edward, the father, becomes a legendary big fish through his stories, just as Manning’s father is portrayed as a “Big Joe” for his significance in the family. Manning’s decision to free the fish reflects his desire not to destroy his father’s glory but preserve

In the short story, “The Boat” by Alistair Macleod, symbolism is used to represent an abstract idea. The boat, being a major symbol of the story was the way of life for the family. As the story goes on, the boat starts to make the family feel confined giving them a choice to leave or stay with the boat. There were symbols that impacted the story that had connection towards the boat. Chain bracelets, the father’s clothes, the books that the father read are all symbols that tied to the boat. The father's chain bracelets and clothes represent the father feeling trapped as a fisherman since he never changes out of them. We find out more about the characters and their personal connection with the boat and the other symbols and what it means to them. The family starts to fall apart due to the kids learning about the father’s books leading to them moving away from home. Symbolism is used when one thing is meant to represent something else adding meaning and emotion to the story which is well represented throughout the story.

This forty page, hardcover text includes short paragraphs on the left page and vibrant illustrations of coastal life by Roy Vickers on the right pages, except for a large picture covering pages 25 and 26. The story takes place in a Kitkatla, a small Tsimshian village community in northern B.C., near the town of Prince Rupert. The story brings to life a legend of the journey of

The father, although coming from a lineage of fisherman, does not possess the traditional mentality. Perhaps some of the anger the mother feels in the story stems, in part, from knowing despite her wish of marrying ‘a fisherman’, her husband is far from it. From the beginning, it is clear that the father was not designed to be a fisherman. His pale skin burns and bubbles in the sun, re-burning rather than tanning (121). His inability to swim (124) contradicts the entire nature of his livelihood. He spends days on the ocean, yet figuratively and literally he can never truly emerge himself in it. He does not want his son to follow in his footsteps, which in a way contradicts what a true fishing family would want, and what his mother

Gray uses the images of an “Aboriginal, not attempting to hitch, outside town” to emphasise the discomfort and disconnection he feels with land and the environment around him. This image is very strong as it shows his disempowerment towards the environment. He feels lost in this town so he moves away from the foreign constructions.

Imagery, detail, and symbolism play a crucial role in this work. Imagery has the function of painting a picture of the situation in the reader’s mind so that he or she is able to develop a version of the story individually. It makes the reading a more personalized experience that helps the reader to understand what’s going on. When O’Brien was just about to escape to Canada to avoid being drafted, he described the scene that was presented in front of him. “The shoreline was dense with brush and timber. I could see tiny red berries on the bushes.” In this quote, the reader can visualize the setting of the lake where he has to make his life-changing decision. It appeals to the visual sense by describing the shoreline and even the sense of

Within both short stories, McLeod paints an even broader sense of the eastern Canadian coast using the domestic principles held there to describe the region. The homestead of John and his grandparents is one where things are not wasted, “cast-off

The world of Ernest Hemingway’s “Big Two-Hearted River” exists through the mostly unemotional eyes of the character Nick. Stemming from his reactions and the suppression of some of his feelings, the reader gets a sense of how Nick is living in a temporary escape from society and his troubles in life. Despite the disaster that befell the town of Seney, this tale remains one of an optimistic ideal because of the various themes of survival and the continuation of life. Although Seney itself is a wasteland, the pine plain and the campsite could easily be seen as an Eden, lush with life and ripe with the survival of nature.

Unlike the wandering narrator, the seafaring narrator focuses his descriptions of the community that is present in nature. The seafarer the utterly rejects the notion that a “sheltering family / could bring consolation for his desolate soul” (25-26). This “sheltering family” (25) that the seafaring narrator alludes to in this line is the exact form of close-knit family that the narrator in “The Wanderer” laments for desperately. While the seafaring narrator offers striking similar descriptions of the landscape being “bound by ice” (9), he does not focus on these descriptions to dwell on the loss of an earthly community. Instead, the narrator in “The Seafarer” finds the landscape that he inhabits wonderfully abundant with natural — even spiritual — elements that are commonly associated with an earthly community. In the barren landscape, the seafaring narrator discovers “the wild swan’s song / sometimes served for music” (19-20) and “the curlew’s cry for the laugher of men” (20-21). These vibrant and vivid descriptions of the natural world that the narrator discovers in the harsh,