Signs and Symbols

Signs and Symbols tells of a foreign family who has voyaged to New York to live alongside the father's brother "the prince" and begin a new life.

The son of the family is severely mentally deranged.

The boy believes that the outside world is out to harm him; he is afraid of nature, of technology and of humankind in general.  He has attempted to take his life more than once, the last time by hanging himself.  For his own safety, his parents have locked him away in an institution.

It ends with a phone call to the parents at midnight looking for "Charlie".

The can spot a few fairytales in this story, the first being Little Red Riding Hood.  There are references to a "basket of jams" that the parents attempt to take as a present to their son in the institution, just as Little Red Riding Hood takes to her grandma in the forest.  The family's journey could be seen as Little Red's journey through the forest.  Lastly, the story makes reference to a girl's "grubby toenails", Aunt Rosa's "wide eyes" and the father "removing his tooth plate", symbols of the wolf's teeth, eyes and claws in the fairy tale.

The wolf, then, could be the sadness of life and the son's illness that the family is trying their best to disguise in happiness, like a wolf dressed as the grandma.

There is also the symbol of the boy locked in the institution, just as Rapunzel is locked away in her tower from the outside world.  He is also locked away from the "Prince", just as Rapunzel was.

Lastly, there is a reoccurring symbol of insomnia.  The father can't sleep at night, and the son suffered from insomnia at age six "like an old man".  The only relation to a fairytale I can draw here is that of Sleeping Beauty.  Perhaps the son is trying to escape life for that final sleep, a deep rest just like the princess, also locked away in a tower waiting for the Prince to come and wake her with a kiss.

One can also see The Odyssey in this story as the family has traveled over seas to finally land in New York.

The part that puzzles me of this story is the fact that the main character, or damsel in distress, is male.  I would like to discuss this in class.

As I find myself drifting to day-dreams instead of focusing on the endless possible signs and symbols of this blog, I will leave you all with my mind's image that has been nostalgically present ever since coming back to Bozeman from a weekend surrounded by love.  It is of my hometown, Sandpoint.