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Oryx And Crake Analysis

Decent Essays

In Oryx and Crake, Snowman goes through life alone after the human race is wiped out. Throughout the novel, Snowman reflects on his life as Jimmy and his interactions with the characters Oryx and Crake, relaying that he might be the only person alive in the novel due to bioengineering and genetic mutation that wiped out the human race. Margaret Atwood affirms the need for human relations when morality and transgression meet through the characters Jimmy and Crake, who have contrasting feelings toward life itself yet have a lasting rapport. Jimmy resembles the solitude of people who feel compassion, and Crake symbolizes the detached, unflappable human will to improve the human race.

At the identification of Jimmy as a “words person,” Atwood reveals a relationship between his isolating sense of morality within an inhumane society he resides in. During an argument …show more content…

In this dystopian society, a successful person is one who relies heavily on numbers and science. However, Jimmy is influenced by the “power of words,” in contrast of Crake, a “numbers person” that is emotionally detached to humane principles. Evidently, the audience can view Jimmy’s deep connection to nature as “the heads made a difference: he thought he could see the animals looking at him reproachfully out of their burning eyes. In some way all of this -- the bonfire, the charred smell, but most of all, the lit-up suffering animals --was his fault, because he’d done nothing to rescue them (Atwood 18).” It’s evident that Jimmy felt a connection to nature and animals at a young age, conveying his sense of morality even as a kid. The

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