The Shipping News | Themes
As a bildungsroman, the novel builds the main character as he moves from one world to another. While those worlds contrast with one another, they are also interrelated. The contrasts are of south to north (the United States to Canada), Quoyle's unnatural urban life of the early novel against nature holding sway over human interactions in Newfoundland, and the dysfunctional with the functional family. The contrasting worlds are not separated along two distinct lines; they overlap. In fact, they are lashed together by the interconnectedness which comes from the unfolding of human...
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