Diction And Symbolism In Fiela's Child

At the beginning of the novel, the motif of water is used to represent Sarah and Handful’s hope for freedom and unnoticeable, understated rebellions. The imagery of water is utilized to represent Sarah’s quiet defiance in her campaign for autonomy and fight to become a lawyer.

The river represents the period between life and death. Another part of this symbol is the air representing life and under the rocks and waterfall representing death. Just as the transition from life to death is in motion, so is the rushing of the water. Both have a beginning and an ending point, but the part in the middle is constantly moving, swirling and churning. As the girl loses hope for survival and the waterfall is approaching, the narrator states, “[S]he becomes part of the river” (45). The girl now crosses over the borderline of life and death, and she is about to be swallowed up by the falls of death and can never return to life. However, when the diver goes into the river to save her, he comes out saying that “he’d never enter that river again” (47). He encounters the spiritual eccentricity of the edge of death when he looks into lifeless girl’s animated eyes, and he can not fathom that experience. Another symbol that is introduced twice is the gurgle of the aquarium, which symbolizes the attempt to understand nature’s cycle of life. As she floats downstream, the girl remembers “her sixth-grade science class, the gurgle of the aquarium at the back of the room”(45). During this moment, all of her thoughts are puzzled, and she cannot understand the death awaiting her. Later on, after sleepless nights, the diver is in the empty school where “the only sound the gurgle of the aquarium” (48). This moment is the point at which he decides

 Water represents Sethe's transition from slavery to freedom. Sethe left Sweet Home pregnant with Denver, "and ran off with no one's help" (p.224). She ran scared and fearful of the trackers following her trail.  Sethe met Amy Denver, a white women, on her way to Ohio.  Amy helped Sethe find the Ohio River.  The river was "one mile of dark water...[and] it looked like home to her and the baby"(p.83).  When Amy left, Sethe traveled downstream and met Stamp Paid.  He helped her and Denver cross the river to freedom.  Stamp took Sethe upstream, "and just when she thought he was taking her back to Kentucky, he [Stamp Paid] turned the flatbed and crossed the Ohio like a shot" (p.91).  The river locked away the memories of Sweet Home and began her life with Denver at 124.   Water represents the transition of Sethe's slave life to her life of freedom.  Again, water has cleansed the soul of the sin of slavery. The river is now a barrier.  It separates Sethe's life of slavery, to her new life of freedom.

The water is symbolic of romantic love as an overwhelming and transforming force that changes in form and changes the people involved. The wave is large, unpredictable and spans out as far as the eye can see. The movement of an all-encompassing emotion like love is impossible to contain, much like water. It is free flowing and goes on forever. “Love was a game, a perpetual creation (Paz, 2). Love and water are both creations of the divine and humans tend to use and abuse them. However, humans are emotional and social animals who need both love and water to survive. Waves have a way of hitting humans all at once, just like love. It renders humans excited and full of surprise at first “wave of surprise” (Paz, 2) like a crashing delight. It also leaves us always wanting more. We have an unquenchable thirst for love and affection, thus we chase it even in its most sinister forms, like an abusive relationship. The narrator is accepting of the wave 's presence when she appears in his home where he was once hesitant of the idea of her in his life. Love also transforms and can change us, like water changes states. It can become overwhelming and hard to breathe, but it is often all around us and

The geography of rivers is important to their symbolism in this story. Antonio’s river starts from a lake, a place of no morals; studies prove that infants are selfish beyond belief, and so is water at its birth. His river carries the water to the ocean, the place where all water lands, carrying the blood and salt and debris that it picks up on its long journey. All high rivers go to the ocean, no matter how many lakes they go through. The ocean is where water goes to die, until its spirit, in clean water, is carried through the clouds back into the frigid mountain lakes, where it is born again. This is the cycle of water, and the cycle of life.

The thoughts and emotions that occur in connection with water are triggered by the lake, and they help Ruth choose transience over any other form of existence. When water floods Fingerbone, the boundaries are overrun, exposing the impermanence of the physical world, and the world’s own natural push towards transience. Water shifts the margins, warning us that the visible world only shows us part of the whole--or perhaps even a mere reflection of a false reality. After the fantastic train wreck in which Ruth’s grandfather perished, the lake sealed itself over in ice, changing boundaries again, while it concealed, like a secret, the last traces of the victims with the illusion of its calm surface. The lake, a source of beauty and darkness, life and death, is “the accumulated past, which vanishes but does not vanish, which perishes and remains” (172). Water carries the symbolic possibility for rebirth– the flood causes the graves in the town cemetery to sink, “so that they looked a little like…empty bellies," suggesting that the dead were born into the receding waters (62). As water and death are so pre-eminent in Sylvie’s consciousness, in dream, she teaches Ruth to dance underwater, to live a life of transience to be

It initially shows worry for her children and sadness for departing from them. For example, the passage states that “when she thought of all the food she had cooked… well the children showed it.” She is proud of her work raising her children and this illustrates that she worked very diligently and strenuously in doing so. The theme of pride continues as she remembers the work she did to make life better for herself and her family after John left her. However, death returns as the image of lighting the lamps represents her lifeforce fading and her initial emotion is fear, then peace as “the lamp is lit” meaning the time has come for her passing and there was no need for her children to “hang on to mother anymore,” meaning she is realizing that her children will be fine without her and is making her peace with

Symbolism was key throughout the story, especially the bass and Sheila Mant. The Bass and Sheila were the conflict in the story, “A moment of hesitation...miraculously, the bass was still on”. The fact that the bass remained for a lengthy period of time shows its importance to the narrator. The bass essentially symbolized the narrators true passions and goals. Which at that time he let go of due to a distraction along the way. The distraction was Sheila Mant. Although the date with Sheila was a temporary illusion of happiness and accomplishment, the excitement soon faded. However, the regret of losing the bass stuck with him. He did however, overcome the obstacle which was Sheila. As for the River, it was very subtle, but represented the narrators

Tonal shifts: How Matthee Emotionally Affects The Reader The western frontier of America was once characterized by the secular plains and the respected buffalos; similarly, South Africa embodies a sense of imagery of the beautiful vegetation and animals. Matthee transposes the reader to a landscape so brightly painted that the trees, birds, elephants, and rivers of old South Africa are characters themselves. As a result of reading Fiela’s Child, my understanding of cultural and contextual elements expanded because Fiela’s Child is convincing, thought-provoking, upsetting, and timeless. This book is a parable that broadens and humanizes my understanding of the conflicts still affecting South Africa today. Particularly, Matthee utilizes

When they got into an argument over math but the dad went back to see if they were wrong, “Later in calmer moments his dad recalculates the sum and it comes out right” (lines 14-15). This not only shows they cooled off but reparation for the conflict by them working through the problem again. The symbolisms of water also represents this which imagery of cool, relaxed streams, “Instead of carrying giant waterfalls inside, we’re streams…” (lines 16-17). The water symbolises the flow of emotions, waterfalls are rushing emotions, and streams are relaxed tides. Even though they fight and argue, they still love each other and work through the problems in the

"Desiree's Baby" by Kate Chopin is a short story set in the 18th century, Louisiana. The short story revolves around racism, social class distinction and a comparison between gender roles. The short story gives the reader a look at the destructive power an individual's pride has over their lover, which in this case is Desiree and Armand. In life, it is inevitable that an individual will experience changes and encounter unanticipated circumstances throughout their lifetime that will affect them.

As book ends, she is lying in the current, giving herself up to fate and the forward flow of the river, with faith for a new life. In the water, she symbolically relives the massacre of her parent and so many Haitian people while attempting to gain clarification on so many questions. Her slight submersion helps her undergo some type of rebirth, “The water was warm for October, warm and shallow, so shallow that I could lie on my back in it with my shoulders only half submerged. . . . cradled by the current, paddling like a newborn in a washbasin.”(310) Danticat illustrates, once again, death. This time, conversely, the remembrance of death allows for growth and life in Amabelle.

The emotional loss refers to the loss of her soul and the strong, arguably spiritual connection they once shared. The quote further implies an impression of guilt, inevitably driving him mad. This feeling of guilt is foreshadowed as well as

By referring to the water as “[her]” water, this demonstrates her desire to carry the water. Since the narrator has spent her time carrying the water, not taking time to “greet cities”, she is now unsure of how to proceed with her life without “[her]”

In Fiela’s child, the van Rooyen and Komoetie families have opposing views. when it comes to attitude and relationships, Fiela has a positive attitude and a strong loving relationship with their children compared to Elias’s angry and negative attitude and has a dominant-submissive relationship with his children. Overall, Bob Keeshan sums it when he said,”Parents are the ultimate role models for children. Every word, movement and action have an effect. No other person or outside force has a greater influence on a child than the parent.”