The motif of poetry
The names of the school leadership are references to famous poets. This is part of a motif about poetry. Typically, people imagine poetry as a kind of delicate, emotional practice, but the motif paints poetry as a kind of mystic superpower through which a person can evoke emotions from their audience using only the sounds of their voice. The motif is that poetry can be viewed as a magic power.
The Persuasion Wars
The novel includes a reference to the mythic "Persuasion Wars" which are a symbol in the book for the need for strong voices. The battle of rhetoric rages on, driving a wedge between the nation. In the ending, Wil discovers the drastic damage caused by the war. By competing for public opinion, the nation has fallen apart and fallen into chaos. This also symbolizes the drastic stakes of language.
The archetypal orphan
Emily is an orphan which means she suffers drastically. Her life is complicated, painful, and difficult. This comes with some positive aspects though, because she is also passionate and her mind has been honed by the difficult life she led in the streets, hustling the public for money to survive on. In school, she is talented, which shows that she takes learning and knowledge seriously, understanding that by improving herself through learning, she helps herself survive.
The symbol denial of love
Emily falls in love, but the school disallows her from it. This is a symbol of their exploitation of her, because as an orphan, she longs for family, which is what love might bring her, but they say she isn't allowed, because she is most useful to them in suffering and loneliness. This is a picture of disenfranchisement and exploitation of the poor, because they have dehumanized her by denying her access to love.
Wil as a symbol
Wil Jamieson is a symbolic character because he serves as a disconnected person from the school. Therefore he adds an objective point of view about the state of affairs. The novel ends with him being martyred and exiled after being involved in a fight that he didn't start and had no part in. Yet, all the same, he finds himself in Broken Hill, observing the horrific damage caused by war. Because his symbolism has to do with his point of view, he is like a martyr.
