Genre
Realistic fiction; Naturalism
Setting and Context
The action takes place in a dinghy boat off the coast of Florida in January 1897
Narrator and Point of View
The narration assumes a third-person omniscient perspective that oscillates between an objective point of view and the point of view of the correspondent.
Tone and Mood
The tone shifts between matter-of-fact lyrical; the mood shifts from despair to hope to relief to grief.
Protagonist and Antagonist
The protagonist is the correspondent; the antagonists are his own mind and nature.
Major Conflict
The major conflict is that the four men must fight for survival against their own despair and an indifferent nature.
Climax
The climax comes when the boat capsizes and the men must swim to the shore, resulting in Billie's death.
Foreshadowing
The correspondent finds four dry cigars in his pocket while another crew member finds three matches. The specificity of the number three foreshadows how one of the men will not make it to the shore alive.
Understatement
Allusions
The correspondent believes the sleeping cook and oiler resemble "a grotesque rendering of the old babes in the wood." This is an allusion to Babes in the Wood, a children's fairytale about two children who are found dead after being abandoned in a forest.
Imagery
Paradox
Parallelism
There are examples of parallel sentence constructions with the repetition in the following clauses: “Then the oiler took both oars; then the correspondent took both oars; then the oiler; then the correspondent. They rowed and they rowed.” “Maybe they think we are out here for sport! Maybe they think we’re fishing. Maybe they think we are fools.”