Swallow The Air Analysis Essay Example

personification to portray May's experience visually and conote her belonging to place, not just people. The river sleeps.. Tree bares of sprint people , arms stretched out and screaming. " Without this belonging May and her culturally aroused people seem lost. She brings up the concept of Aboriginality and what it means to belong and how to multiculturally. We see this concept become stronger in the last several chapters, she states simply "They are part of this place. " Another symbol in Swallow the Air which has ties to belonging is the Jacaranda tree "It isnt meant to be here and yet is is accepted and valued. This is to symbolise the hope that May and other may belong even if their somewhere they shouldn’t. In the beginning of the novel, May finds a dead stingray she describes it as "An angel fallen, laying on its back. " Later May imagines her Aunty "As an angel, laying out her wings beneath the satelite of the sky. May cuts the stingray open so it is "Spilling at the sides, it was free". Afterward when May has to find out where she belongs, she says of Johnny's rejection of her idea "And I leave, with our dreams spilling at our feet.