Part I: Symbols of Cancer
*note: Cancer is an important image in the book. Alexandra seems to have an abnormal amount of fear for cancer. She often sees many ordinary objects as symbols of cancer or even the foreshadowing of its onset. For example, while attending one of their weekly meetings, the first that the reader is introduced to Alexandra notes her discomfort towards a platter bearing the emblem of a crab. "Cancer. Alexandra feared it; she saw its emblem everywhere in nature-- in clusters of blueberries in the neglected places by rocks and bogs, in the grapes ripening on the sagging rotten arbor outside her kitchen windows, in the ants bringing up conical granular hills in the cracks of her asphalt driveway, in all the blind and irresistible multiplications." (25) After reading this line, and the several others in the text that refer to the either the crab or other symbols of cancer, it makes me wonder why Alexandra has a phobia of the disease. Prior to the first mention of the crab as a symbol of cancer, when Alexandra was finished conjuring up the storm, as the crabs were "emerging from their holes by the dozen and scurrying sideways towards the frothing sea... Alexandra steeled herself and crunched one beneath the sole of her bare foot...she danced from crab to crab, crushing them. Her face from hair line to chin streamed and all the colors of the rainbow were in this liquid film, because of the agitation of her aura." (17) Until, I later discovered Alexandra's connection of the crabs too cancer, I did not understand the previous quote any more than her excuse that there must always be a sacrifice. However, now, I feel that there is significance behind her sacrifice being the crabs, and her agitation while she is crushing them. Alexandra's fear of cancer also persists throughout the novel, interfering with her everyday life. As evident when she asks Sukie "How's your vodka supply?", and remembers that "someone had once told her that not only was vodka less fattening but it irritated the lining of your stomach less than gin. Irritation, psychic as well as physical, was the source of cancer. Those get it, who leave themselves open to the idea of it; all it takes is one single cell gone crazy. Nature is always waiting, waiting for you to lose faith so she can insert her fatal stitch" (25)
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| Ants |
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| geological formation called blueberries: Note* According to scienceclarified.com these geological formations only form with the presence of water. While it is possible that Alexandra was referring to blueberries as in the fruit. I felt that this image was a more fitting representation of her fear and as an image referring to cancer |
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| clusters of grapes: |
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| Crab: |
