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Chapter 20
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Island of the Blue Dolphins, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Natural World
Solitude
Friendship
Gender Roles and Survival
Colonialism, Violence, and Indigenous Culture
Summary
Analysis
When Karana leaves the cave that night, she leaves Rontu inside—she doesn’t want him to find the Aleuts’ dogs, if they’re on the island. The Aleuts are camping where they did last time, about a half a league from Karana’s cave. She wonders if she should move to the cave where the wild dogs lived. The men don’t frighten Karana; they’re too busy. Rather, she’s worried the girl will find her. There are edible roots and seeds in the ravine, and the girl might notice the spring and Karana’s footprints. After staring at the Aleut camp for a while, Karana decides to stay in the ravine.
It doesn’t make any difference to Karana that the Aleut girl is female; she’s dangerous because she’s an Aleut. Making this assumption about the girl makes sense, at this point, because of how violent and destructive the Aleuts were during their last visit. As Karana weighs her options and decides to stay in the cave, she again shows how well she knows the island and can use that knowledge to predict how someone else will interact with it.
Themes
Karana stays inside the cave until the next full moon. At this point she needs food, so she and Rontu hike to the headland. Three of the whale ribs are missing from her fence, but nobody is there. Karana gathers a basket of seawater and abalones. The next time Karana goes out for food it’s too dark to get to the reef, so she spends several dark nights digging roots. Karana doesn’t see the Aleuts, though she does find the girl’s footsteps further down in the ravine. Fortunately, the Aleuts haven’t brought dogs.
Being able to effectively gather food at night, when the light is poor, is another indicator of how well Karana knows both the island and how to perform these tasks. And she shows that she’s also resourceful and can feed herself, even when the situation isn’t ideal (when she digs roots in the dark, for instance). But the girl’s footsteps hint that Karana might not be totally successful in staying hidden.
Themes
Karana and Rontu’s days are long. At first, Rontu paces and resents being cooped up. But he soon gets used to it and watches Karana work on her cormorant skirt. She works in the light of the fish lamps and carefully cuts the cormorant skins, so the feathers go in different directions in different parts of the skirt. When she runs out of fish for light, she starts taking it outside to work. She sometimes finds footprints, but they’re not close to the cave. Karana feels safe—the Aleuts will be gone by the end of the month, as winter is coming.
While the winter storms present their own problems (such as making it dangerous to go out on the canoe and fish), they also have an upside—terrible winter weather, Karana implies, is what causes the Aleuts to end their hunting trips. However, her confidence here mirrors her father’s confidence that the Aleuts were going to leave at the beginning of the novel, which ominously foreshadows that this might not end as well as she hopes.
Themes
This is the first time Karana has seen the skirt in the sunlight. The black feathers shimmer green and gold, and it’s so beautiful that Karana is almost giddy. As Karana admires the skirt, though, Rontu suddenly leaps up and Karana hears steps. It’s the girl. Karana grabs her spear, but she doesn’t throw it—she doesn’t know why. When the girl speaks, Rontu approaches her with his hackles raised. He allows her to touch him, and the girl makes a motion as though Rontu is hers. Karana cries, shakes her head, and picks up the spear, but the girl makes another motion that seems to say Rontu is Karana’s.
Karana’s reaction to seeing her skirt in the sunlight shows that she definitely hasn’t given up on being feminine, just because she performs masculine tasks to survive. She still delights in traditionally feminine things, perhaps especially knowing that she has the skill to create them. Threatening the girl with her spear also mirrors how Karana almost killed Rontu at first. Karana doesn’t throw her spear because, as frightened as she is of the Aleuts, and as much as she hates them, she’s lonely—the presence of another human is irresistible.
Themes
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The girl introduces herself as Tutok, but Karana ignores this and calls Rontu to her. Tutok smiles and points to the cormorant skirt. She says a word that sounds a lot like the word for “pretty” in Karana’s language. Karana is so proud of the skirt that she holds it up so it glimmers in the sunlight. Tutok approaches Karana and holds the skirt up to herself. She’s a bit older, and she’s graceful, but Karana hates the Aleuts. She takes her skirt back. The girl says the word that sounds like “pretty” again. It’s good to hear words again—even if an enemy is saying them.
Karana is extremely conflicted here. The Aleuts killed her friends and family, and the threat they pose is why Karana has spent the last few years on the island living in fear of their likely return. But Tutok doesn’t seem particularly threatening on her own. She compliments the skirt, and it’s a big deal for Karana to hear another person speaking after so long alone. And noting that the words for “pretty” aren’t so different suggests that the girls might have more in common than they think.
Themes
Tutok continues to speak, but Karana doesn’t understand much of what she says. Tutok seems to want to know if Karana lives in the cave, but Karana gestures that she lives far away across the island. She’s certain that Tutok will come back with men and take her to their camp. But still, Karana doesn’t throw her spear. Tutok touches Karana’s arm, which Karana doesn’t like. Then, she drinks from the stream and disappears.
Killing Tutok would tip the other Aleuts off to the fact that there’s someone else on the island. So even though Karana hesitates to throw the spear because she craves human contact, she’s also no doubt considering that killing Tutok might end badly for her, too.
Themes
Karana spends the rest of the day packing her things. She plans to take her canoe to the western part of the island until the Aleuts leave. Karana carries her baskets away a few at a time, but when she returns for the final two, she can tell someone has been there. Afraid that someone is waiting for her to go into the cave so they can capture her, Karana turns away. But as she does, she sees a string of black stones on one of the rocks.
At first, it’s frightening to realize someone has been here. But the string of stones also doesn’t seem at all threatening. Instead, it seems like a peace offering of sorts. But to add more nuance to this, Karana also remembers that Captain Orlov left her tribe strings of beads and not the promised spearheads, so these beads are probably very ambivalent in Karana’s mind.
Themes
