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Isabel: Caribbean Sea – 1994, 3 days
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Refugee, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Trauma and Coming of Age
Injustice and Cruelty vs. Empathy and Social Responsibility
Hope vs. Despair
Family, Displacement, and Culture
Invisibility and the Refugee Experience
Summary
Analysis
Fatima continues to sob at having given away Hana, and Mahmoud can tell that his mother is ready to give up. He works to keep her head above the water, telling her that he needs her. Mahmoud is also deeply upset with himself at giving away Hana, knowing that his mother might never forgive him, but he thinks that at least Hana is safe.
Water continues to symbolize the despair that Mahmoud and his mother are experiencing. Even while Mahmoud takes on the role of an adult, he hopes that by reminding Fatima of his own need for her as her child, she can be convinced to hang on for him.
Themes
Mahmoud suddenly sees a man floating face down in the water with a life jacket on. Mahmoud swims over to him, and sees that he is dead. Mahmoud fights his fear and takes the life jacket off of the man. He realizes that he will be condemning the man to the bottom of the sea, and says a funeral prayer for him. Mahmoud then gives Fatima the life jacket, and he floats alongside her, but he still doesn’t know how he’ll get them to safety.
Mahmoud continues to have to make difficult decisions in the face of his traumatic predicament. He not only condemns a man not to get a proper burial, but he also faces his fears in order to retrieve the man’s life jacket from his body. This is yet another incident which forces Mahmoud to grow up beyond his years.
Themes
