Blackbird House

The story of Coral and Vincent in “The Edge of the World” introduces one of the novel’s main themes: Love as Motivation. For an entire year, Coral refuses to relinquish hope that her family survived the storm and the British naval presence. Her love for her family enables her to subsist and establish a turnip farm without help:

She had planted the field the way she thought John would want her to. Though the ground was cold, she dug in row after row of turnips, then she planted corn; at last she sprinkled the seedpods of pink sweet peas, feed for the cows they would someday have, and for remembrance as well. John had favored sweet peas, and had brought her armfuls of the flowers when he was courting her (13).

Coral toils to create John’s farm, which symbolizes their relationship and helps her hold onto hope. The motivational power of love is likewise present in Vincent’s will to survive and return. By the end of his prison sentence, “[t]here was no water left inside him. There was nothing inside him at all” (18). After all he endures, Vincent feels empty and unable to cry, suggesting that he has nothing to live for. Nevertheless, when he returns and sees the bountiful farm, “[h]e thought about how love could move you in ways you wouldn’t have imagined, one foot in front of the other, even when you thought you had nothing left inside” (21). Vincent’s musings reveal that he’s not empty: Love motivates his journey home, and he realizes that the emotion guided his mother’s perseverance through grief as well.

Like the Hadleys, Lysander Wynn demonstrates how love can inspire action. Although he and Ruth never explicitly express their feelings for one another, Lysander’s actions expose his tenderness for her. Both have endured trauma yet find solace in each other. Lysander’s setting out to obtain a red pear tree for Ruth emphasizes the motivational power of love: He journeys two weeks to find it. In fact, “[h]e would have gone father still if it had been necessary […] He would have kept on even if snow had begun to fall” (37). Motivated by the desire to make Ruth happy, Lysander would have continued as long as necessary. Like Coral and Vincent, Lysander succeeds because he’s fueled by love.

Also prominent is the novel’s second main theme, which these chapters introduce: The Power of Place in Shaping Lives. In “The Witch of Truro,” the description of the setting underscores how physical conditions can impact surroundings: “From every bitter thing, after all, something hardy will surely grow. From every difficulty, the seed that’s sewn is much stronger” (23). This literally describes Cape Cod’s physical landscape, which can be brutal and barren. However, the notion that life can sprout from the harshest conditions metaphorically refers to the resilience in people that both Ruth and Lysander’s experiences illustrate. For Ruth, “[i]t was not enough that she should lose her mother and her father, one after the other, now she had lost Blackbird Hill, and with it she had lost herself” (25). Her identity is inextricably linked to where she lived: the hill that provided for her and her cows. However, after fire destroys that home, she finds a way to survive. For Lysander, his identity as a sailor and his existence on the sea ultimately resulted in his injury and altered his life and his profession. They both are shaped by the harsh reality of where they live, and the solace of the farm also helps shape their love for one another.

In addition to introducing thematic elements, this section establishes the use of magical realism and the motif of the titular blackbird. Lysander’s coughing up halibut teeth years after his fishing accident is an impossibility. However, this detail underscores how that trauma will never leave him. Similarly, after the storm in “The Edge of the World,” Isaac’s blackbird, Ink, returns but is now white. Whether an anomaly or a ghost, this occurrence is otherworldly. Once a source of joy for Isaac, the bird returns to illustrate Coral’s state of mind. She accepts the loss of her family only when the bird reappears. She tries to dispose of it because the grief of her loss, like the bird, haunts her. Likewise, Ruth has endured multiple tragedies. When she’s driven from her home by death and destruction, “[a] blackbird seemed to swoop by followed by a herd of skinny milk-cows that had all turned to pitch in the fire” (25). The bird, which precedes Ruth’s walk into town, is a harbinger of sorrow. However, the blackbird motif signals not only sorrow but resilience, introducing the novel’s third main theme: Resilience Resulting From Adversity. Despite great losses, both Coral and Ruth become stronger through their struggles, and they survive and carry on. Although Coral mourns at the sight of the white blackbird, she eventually cultivates a thriving farm, whereas the bird literally leads Ruth away from her trauma. Both women exhibit perseverance in the face of suffering, and the blackbird accompanies them. Ultimately, the magical animal serves as a thread uniting the inhabitants of Blackbird House.