Question

In at least 150 words, identify a theme in "Through the Tunnel" and explain how the setting of the story contributes to that theme.

Answer 1

One theme that is present in Doris Lessing's "Through the Tunnel" is the attainment of independence.

Step-by-step explanation:

One of the subjects in "Through the Tunnel" features the developing individualism of a young boy.

The setting is characterized as the spot, time, or potentially length of significant occasions in a story which finished in a goals; setting is regularly passed on to perusers using rich symbolism.

In the story, Jerry is traveling at the shoreline with his mom. Indeed, even from the earliest starting point, Jerry needs to go off without anyone else's input to 'examine those stones down there.' He needs to investigate the zone independent from anyone else, to affirm his developing interest about the universe of his youth excursions. His mom imagines that the region where he needs to investigate is 'a wild-looking spot' with no obvious vacationers knowledge, however this is unequivocally what Jerry loves about the spot: it is obscure, huge, and perhaps even perilous. Truth be told, it is a 'precarious plunge to the sound.'

Lessing further conveys this topic of independence into resulting pictures of another set. This time, Jerry runs over a gathering of young men who are 'jumping over and over from a high point into a well of blue ocean between unpleasant, pointed rocks.' Apparently, this independence conveys with it a high cost. Jerry should and needs to procure his entitlement to swim with the more seasoned young men. In any case, he before long finds that he should vanquish the long, dim, and foreboding passage under an extraordinary hindrance shake in the event that he needs to achieve a similar swimming accomplishment as the greater young men. Indeed, the imagery presents an imposing portrait of challenge and peril characteristic of a theme which explores courageous individualism.

Answer 2

In "Through the Tunnel," the negative connotations and dangerous imagery associated with the "wild bay" help to convey the theme that growing up can be a painful and scary process. Jerry longs to grow up and to fit in with the "older boys -- men to Jerry" who swim and dive at the wild bay rather than remain on the "safe beach" with his mother, a beach later described as "a place for children." The way to the wild bay is marked with "rough, sharp rock" and the water shows "stains of purple and darker blue." The rocks sound as if they could do a great deal of damage to the body, and the stains are described like a bruise. It sounds painful. Then, "rocks lay like discoloured monsters under the surface" of the water and "irregular cold currents from the deep shocked [Jerry's] limbs." This place sounds frightening and alarming and unpredictable. Given that this is the location associated with maturity, with the time after childhood, we can understand that the process of growing up and becoming a man is a time that is fraught with dangers and fear, because Jerry endures both in the "wild bay." hopes this helps