Symbolism In Joseph Boyden's Three Day Road

War: Kills from the Inside Out Lars Fredrik Händler Svendsen, a famous Norwegian philosopher once stated that “self-identity is inextricably bound up with the identity of the surroundings.” Svendsen is arriving at the conclusion that one’s own identity is directly connected to their surroundings and so a change in environment would consequently alter one’s self-identity. Therefore, the violent and gruesome acts that are a product of war will alter the identity of those who are surrounded by such acts. Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road expresses how war consumes one’s identity through the utilization of symbolism. The loss of identity arising from war is demonstrated through the symbolism of morphine, the windigo and eyes. Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road utilizes symbolism to articulate the identity-consuming nature of war, such as the symbolism of morphine. The symbolism of …show more content…
Even though Elijah’s british accent is an act, it is still a part of his identity. And so the loss of the accent shows how he loses all aspects about his identity when he uses the morphine, whether it is genuine or not. The morphine allows Elijah to isolate himself from the war which results in the loss of his accent, and therefore his identity. The symbolism of morphine within the novel is utilized to reveal how war consumes one’s identity. Elijah’s addiction to the morphine also attributes to his savage acts and transformation into a windigo, and this symbolism of the windigo demonstrates how war consumes one’s identity. Elijah’s loss of identity can be observed when he begins to develop aspects of a windigo, such as eating human flesh. On Christmas Elijah visits with french men in a town to show them his “trophies”, or the scalps of the people he has killed, and he states that one man gave him some meat as a gift. After Elijah says that the meat is from a German, Xavier forces himself to throw up his stomach