The Wars

I think that the suffering of animals defines Findlay's ideas of humanity and war. The animals come to symbolize both innocence and the relationship of human beings to the natural world. Against the larger context of war, these animals become victims of the fighting. As a result the natural world is destroyed as well as the man-made world. Robert sees the animals as innocent bystanders in a campaign of human arrogance and madness. The rabbits that belonged to Rowena, in particular, reflect an innocence and purity that Robert feels has been extinguished by the war.