Remarkable Creatures

“We were to be moved on, then, like sheep shifted from one cropped field to another. And John must be our shepherd.”

Elizabeth describes her and her sisters’ plight after their parents’ death. Since they aren’t married, their brother becomes their guardian. The comparison of the sisters to sheep highlights their lack of agency as women in the 19th century, with their closest male relative, their brother John, directing their lives as their “shepherd.”

“The following season, she was treated as a fine gown that has dated in storage, the neckline now too high or low, the cloth a touch faded, the cut no longer so flattering.”

Elizabeth describes how quickly a woman can fade into obscurity when she doesn’t make a match. Comparing Margaret to an out-of-fashion garment emphasizes society’s preoccupation with youth and beauty in women.

“We would see Captain Cury from time to time upon the beach, but until Miss Elizabeth come to Lyme, the shore were deserted of other curie hunters apart from us.”

When Mary narrates, the author uses dialect to indicate that she is from a lower social class. The passage also highlights how Elizabeth’s arrival in Lyme Regis changes Mary’s life as well as the fate of the town. Previously, fossil hunting was considered a task for the poor and desperate, but Elizabeth grants it a more academic air since she is from the middle class.

“[H]er big blue eyes turned hard like ice covering a puddle, and she talked about me behind her hand with her new friends.”

The simile describes Fanny’s hardening attitude toward Mary after she allows them to get caught by the rising tide. The passage illustrates how people, even within Mary’s social class, judge her for her interest in fossil hunting and ostracize her.

“I would put up with a great deal of dirt and confusion to see what had been laid out on a table in the middle of the room and surrounded by candles, like a pagan offering.”

Elizabeth describes the excitement of finding the ichthyosaur and seeing it up close for the first time. The use of religious language comparing the tableau to a pagan ritual illustrates how the devout saw the fossil as evil, emphasizing the conflict created by Mary and Elizabeth’s discoveries.

“He was eyeing the skull as if it were a haunch of venison dressed in port sauce.”

Elizabeth distinguishes herself and Mary as fossil hunters and sneeringly portrays Lord Henley as a collector. The figurative language describes how he views the specimen not as something of value but as something to be consumed or profited from.

“According to [Bishop Ussher], God created Heaven and Earth on the night preceding the 23rd of October 4004 B.C.”

Elizabeth refers to James Ussher, an Irish bishop in the Anglican church whose literal interpretation of the Bible and studies in Biblical chronology led him to assert that God created the universe precisely on October 23, 4004 B.C. Mary and Fanny’s church denomination accepts this theory, leading them to denounce Mary’s findings since they are proof of an older earth.

“Fanny Miller’s forehead was a field of furrows. One of the pews creaked in the stillness.”

As Elizabeth confronts the rector with her questions, Fanny awkwardly sits in the church, listening to a conversation she undoubtedly sees as blasphemous. The metaphor in the quote describes the dismay and judgment on her face.

“By March Margaret had always faded like a threadbare nightgown worn for too long.”

Far more extroverted than Louise and Elizabeth, Margaret thrives on social interaction. Elizabeth explains why they often traveled back to London in the spring to allow Margaret to socialize, comparing Margaret’s diminished emotional state to a tattered gown.

“[H]is answers did not feel complete. It was like having a meal and not getting quite enough to eat.”

Mary craves more profound spiritual answers to her questions than the pat responses she gets from the clergy. She often refers to the way religion leaves her feeling empty and, in this passage, compares her yearning to physical hunger.

“[I] wondered why it was that the pretty ones were always rescued before the plain. That was how the world worked: With her big eyes and dainty features, Fanny did not get stuck, whereas I was caught in the mud, the cliff threatening to crumble on top of me.”

Mr. Buckland rescues Fanny from the landslide first, prompting Mary to see the situation as a metaphor for her life. Though she and Fanny are in the same social class, Mary isn’t conventionally attractive, which makes Fanny more likely to find a husband. Mary feels stuck and suffocated in her social class, which is mirrored in the way she is literally trapped in the mud.

“[T]he croc eye watched us both. Captain Cury and I are going to be like the croc, I thought. We will become fossils, trapped upon the beach forever.”

The landslide accident forces Mary to consider her mortality, especially as she witnesses Captain Cury’s death. This marks a shift in her fossil-hunting pursuits as she shifts from only seeing it as a way to making money and considers that the fossils were living creatures, just as she is a living creature and will one day die.

“Death had come and camped next to her on the beach, taking Captain Cury while sparing her, and reminding her of its presence and of her own limits.”

The personification of death as a living being intensifies Mary’s experience of being trapped in the mud. The accident forces her to think about her mortality, and the tragedy marks a significant moment in her maturity.

“For Mary’s interest in men piqued my own, which I had thought dead but discovered was merely dormant, a rosebush that needed but a little attention to attempt to flower.”

Elizabeth describes the reawakening of her desire while seeing Mary flirt with Mr. Buckland. Being around Mary reminds Elizabeth of the joys of youth, and her zest for life inspires Elizabeth. Roses often symbolize sexuality and desire, and here, they represent the reanimation of Elizabeth’s passion.

“Oh, I expect your ichthyosaurus has a place in Aristotle’s Great Chain of Being.”

Mr. Buckland refers to Aristotle’s theory that all creation exists in a hierarchy, with God at the top and rocks and minerals at the bottom. The concept asserts that all creation has its place in the order and any disruption results in chaos. Notably, the idea was widely accepted in the medieval era, and women were usually listed below men in the hierarchy.

“It contained a lock of his thick hair.”

The exchange of a lock of hair was seen as a sign of courtship or engagement in 19th-century England. By giving Mary this sentimental token, Colonel Birch leads her to believe that he intends to marry her.

“[M]y mind sank down again like a leaf settling to the bottom of a pond.”

When Mary and Mr. Buckland find the plesiosaur, the discovery only deepens Mary’s longing to understand the creatures and reconcile that new knowledge with what she’s always been taught in church. The use of figurative language describes her mental turmoil and despair.

“My life led up to that moment, then led away again, like the tide making its highest mark on the beach and then retreating.”

The tidal movements have always been a part of Mary’s life, and she has internalized them as a part of her being. The tide becomes a metaphor symbolizing the shift in Mary’s life after the discovery of the plesiosaur.

“While I accommodated her absence, a dull ache in my heart remained, like a fracture that, though healed, ever after flares up during damp weather.”

Elizabeth’s broken relationship with Mary pains her as she misses her company and the intellectual stimulation of hunting fossils and learning together. The simile compares the broken friendship to a painful physical injury that never fully heals and causes lingering pain.

“I had always thought of the sea as a boundary keeping me in my place on land. Now though, it became an opening.”

Sea voyages often symbolize significant change, and Elizabeth’s solo journey to London marks a shift in her character as she travels alone for the first time. The time aboard the ship changes her perspective as she stares at the ocean instead of the sand and allows her time to consider her life’s purpose. She becomes more independent and confident as a result of the journey.

“The sun lit the houses piling up the hill, and the sea was silvery like a mirror. The boats moored in the harbor were strewn about like sticks, abandoned however the water set them on the seabed at low tide.”

The author uses figurative language to describe Mary’s vision of the shoreline. The description highlights the beauty of nature and the boats’ smallness compared to the sea’s vastness, paralleling the feeling Mary gets each time she finds a fossil—it reminds her of how small she is in the vastness of time.

“But fossils were more than money to me now—they had become a kind of life, a whole stone world that I were a part of.”

Mary relates how she has grown in wisdom and has come to view fossils with respect. The fossils widen Mary’s view of the world, space, and deep time, and she understands that she has a role and purpose in all this, too.

“[T]his was the lightning that signaled my greatest happiness, in all my life.”

Lightning marks significant moments in Mary’s life, and she compares her reunification with Elizabeth to a reawakening of the electricity that flows through her body. This highlights the exceptional nature of their friendship since Mary’s friendship with Elizabeth transcends her love for a man, the pleasure she felt when she had sex, and even her professional successes.