47 pages • 1 hour read
The Raft
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Symbols & Motifs
Robie’s Nose Ring and Henna Tattoo
Robie’s piercing and henna tattoo, both of which she gets during her stay in Honolulu, at the start of the book, are symbols of her interest in experimenting with independence. They represent her efforts to try on the trappings of adulthood. While they seem, to Robie, to be significant statements of her nearly-adult identity at the time that she gets them, the nose ring and the henna tattoo later become symbols of her naiveté, rather than her maturity. When she is out on the ocean, truly on her own, and forced into fending entirely for herself, the notion that she was fending for herself by choosing a piercing seems laughable.
The Skittles and The Journal
The journal andSkittles are more than a juicy detail about Robie’s life on the raft. They embody her last link to civilization and to her civilized self. They also allow Bodeen to establish a lingering sense of the rules of society which apply on land, but which begin to disintegrate on the raft. Robie knows that within the framework of life on land (that is, life in society) the journal and the Skittles belong to Max, and as such, she should respect the division between his possessions and her possessions. At first, she honors these social niceties, resisting the temptation of eating the Skittles, and also the temptation of invading his privacy to read the journal.
As time passes, and her circumstances become direr, Robie abandons the rules that apply on land, and starts moving into a new set of rules for castaway life, where there actually is only one rule: the imperative to survive. The Skittles and the journal are significant because they illustrate her transition from one framework to another.
The Ocean
The ocean, a seemingly unconquerable and mysterious set of circumstances, represents the adult world, or the “real world” that Robie, like all young people, must learn to navigate without her parents’ protection.
Young Animals
In tandem with the symbol of the ocean, young animals (including two albatrosses and a baby seal) represent Robie’s attempt to learn to navigate the real world. Two of the three young animals fail to achieve a successful launch into adulthood, and Robie tries to use this to predict her own chances of survival.
Crashes
Bodeen creates a motif of crashes: the plane crash, the raft running ashore at Lisianski, and Max’s car crash on the way back from the concert with his girlfriend. In each case, the crashes reveal the helplessness of those involved. Robie is helpless to stop the raft from flipping over the reef at Lisianski. Max is unable to save both Larry and Brandy.
This motif therefore reveals the vulnerability of humans, who, despite their hubris in thinking they can conquer the natural world, or control the course of their lives, must be reminded, in Bodeen’s world, that they are not as in-control as they would like to believe.
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