Isola: A Novel

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death, physical abuse, and emotional abuse.

Birds appear throughout the text both physically and figuratively in descriptive imagery symbolizing Marguerite’s freedom. For example, in Perigord, Marguerite has a pet finch that she keeps in an ornate, gilded cage. This bird represents Marguerite’s confinement, as she lives in a comfortable and rich castle, but she is essentially imprisoned within it. At La Rochelle, Marguerite envies Alys’s freedom of movement throughout the house and the city, so she compares Alys to a sparrow. Like a bird, Alys can come and go as she pleases without restriction, whereas Marguerite can only traverse a few rooms in the house. Aboard the ship in the middle of the ocean, there are no birds, but Marguerite again employs bird imagery to express her new feelings of freedom. She compares the stars to birds during her nighttime meetings with Auguste because she feels able to express her true desires unreservedly under cover of darkness.

Goodman uses the birds on the island to expand this symbol further, using it as a touchstone for Marguerite’s evolving relationship to her own independence.