Regeneration: Symbols

Bumble bee - Rivers

“Rivers got up and went across to the window. He found a bumble bee, between the curtain and the window, batting itself against the glass, fetched a file from the desk and, using it as a barrier, guided the insect into the open air.” (pg 178)

Battalion Canary - Prior

“Well, obviously, I’m affected at lower concentrations than anybody else. But then so what? I can be the battalion canary.”

Abrahamic Bargain - Rivers

The bargain on which all patriarchal societies are founded on. “If you, who are young and strong, will obey me, who am old and weak, even to the extent of being prepared to sacrifice your life, then in the course of time you will peacefully inherit, and be able to exact the same obedience from your sons.” (pg 200)

Hens - Charles

“One hen, weaker than the rest, was being picked on by the others. Its chest was bare of feathers and raw where they’d picked at it. 

    I’ll have to get that one out and wring its neck, Charles said.

    Can’t you just isolate her and then put her back in?

   No. Once they start they never stop.” (pg 202)

Hens - Rivers

“He remembered them struggling out of the eggs, how exhausted, wet and miserable they looked, and yet curiously powerful, little Atlases struggling to hold up the world. Now the same chicks were scruffy, bedraggled things running in the coops.” (pg 203-204)

Chrysalis

“Cut a chrysalis open, and you will find a rotting caterpillar. What you will never find is that mythical creature, half caterpillar, half butterfly, a fit emblem of the human soul.”