Metaphor for cleansing
In the society where Kira lives, the villagers have the tradition of burning the house of a recently deceased person. The reason why that person’s house was being burnt was because the villagers hoped to avoid spreading the disease that killed the person in question by burning the place where the disease started. Kira mentions that when more people in the village get sick, whether it the disease were related or not, the people left alive may choose to burn every house in the village. The act of burning and fire in the novel are used here as a metaphor for cleansing, as it appears in instances when people would feel the need for a new start or the need to break away from a painful part of their past.
Just like livestock
When Vandara comes and tells Kira that she no longer can live on the land her mother used to live, she also reveals what the village plans to build on that plot. The women from the village planned to build a pen for the healthy children in the village. Here, Vandara treats the children as one would treat livestock and the comparison between the two groups highlights the idea that children are seen as being powerless in the society. They are not to be trusted or left on their own, let alone let to make decisions and be treated as slightly more intelligent creatures than an animal raised for slaughter.
Metaphor for the way society works
When Kira and Vandara enter the room where the Elders hold meetings, they both bow in front of a crucifix despite the fact that they do not know what it represents or for what it stands for. Their actions are seen as a metaphor that stands for the way people treat figures with authority in general and traditions. The community usually respects unwritten rules and traditions and offers all their power to a selected few even if they do not know why they do such thing. They simply do those things because those before them did them too.
Metaphor for the capitalist society
Vandara is a powerful character who seems to be able to influence those around her. Vandara convinced other women that Kira was useless so they all agreed to do everything in their power to drive her out of the village. The reason why they did it was because they saw Kira as being useless and a burden to the community. The person who stresses Kira’s incapability to work is Vandara. Because of this, she can be seen as a metaphor for the capitalist society, driven by the need to earn more money and to make everything and everyone as useful as possible. If a person is different and if their talents are not the norm inside the society, the others will try to get rid of such person because she represents a liability.
Metaphor for truth
Kira is amazed when she sees people reading and her deepest desire is to learn how to read and to have books of her own. Because of the society she lives in, there is the possibility that Kira will never be able to learn how to read. The reason why Kira wishes to learn how to read and write is because she thinks that the only way truth can be kept in history is through writing. The oral tradition ensures that information are passed down from one generation to another but there is no method to verify whether what a person says is true or not. But when something is written down, no one can deny that the words written down are the truth.
