Laura  

The two novels, Atonement and Saturday, have common types of symbols that ultimately foreshadow the characters’ futures. In Atonement, the vase that Cecilia and Robbie break ends up symbolizing the whole novel. The broken vase represented the fragile and beloved things that would break in the Tallis house. For instance, Briony’s imagination runs wild and she ends up tearing apart people’s lives. However, when Cecilia tries to fix the vase she fails, which further symbolizes that once something valuable has been broken it can never be restored to its original condition. The novel, Saturday, has a similar type of symbol, which also represents the whole plot structure of the book. During the first chapter the main character, Henry Perowne, is having difficulty sleeping due to a “bright light.” As the chapter continues the audience soon realizes that Perowne is witnessing a burning airplane falling from the sky during the middle of the night. This symbol is very similar to the broken vase symbol because it represents how things can change in a single instant and ultimately transform a person’s life. For example, Perowne is just going about his Saturday like another other day. He goes to work, visits his sick mother, spends time with friends, and cooks dinner for his family. However, his whole routine is interrupted by Baxter (the antagonist) who threatens to hurt his family. Thus, the plane represented how life can be so repetitive until one tiny event can change the whole outcome. McEwan used these subtle events in order to give the reader a small hint about his novels’ outcomes.

 

Another interesting symbol McEwan uses in both of these novels is vascular dementia. It plays a smaller role in Saturday than it does in Atonement; nonetheless, it still represents the part of life that no one can control, death. In Atonement, death comes to Briony in the form of memory loss, which ultimately frees her from her guilt of failing to atone for past sins. Yet in Saturday, Perowne’s mother is in a nursing home suffering from the exact same disease, which is ironic because her son cannot save her even though he is a neurosurgeon. It just goes to show that death cannot be stopped or controlled by anyone and that no matter who you are it will always catch up to you eventually.