Surfacing by Margaret Atwood

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Margaret Atwood makes use of several dichotomies throughout her novel, all to demonstrate how the truth is in the eye of the beholder. On the surface, the novel appears to be about a well put together woman searching for her father; however, in reality, this novel dives deep into a person’s essential nature where appearance and reality are anything but the same. She reminds readers that in reality, appearances barely scratch the surface of the truth. In Surfacing, Atwood relates new experiences to previous events that affect the narrator’s adult life, therefore ruining many of her relationships between her and loved ones. In the novel, the story places a position on the narrator’s feelings towards the blue bird known as the heron. One may come to the realization that the death of the bird haunts her. She sees evidence of two campers entering the area beforehand, and she immediately blames the Americans for its death. “…beautiful from a distance but it couldn’t be tamed or cooked or trained to talk, the only relation they could have to a thing like that was to destroy it…. It must have been the Americans; they were in there now, we would meet them” (118). The dead bird symbolizes her feelings about losing what she wanted to authority figures. She lost her child to an abortion she had as a teen because her boyfriend-authority figure-made her think the abortion was the right thing to do. “…I’ll start inventing them and there will be no way of correcting it, the ones who could help are gone” (70). To the old Canadians, many believed that the Americans were corrupted people. If one wanted to compare and contrast Americans today one can justify that “No Child Left Behind” is now corrupting education. When President Bush’s administration fought for funds in order for schools to meet guidelines they now receive sufficient amount of funds if there quota is met from the

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