Knives: In Act I Scene I, knives are used as a way to represent the mother's anger. Whenever she talks about the knife, she becomes angry and dramatic which gives us as readers a background on why she reacted that way. The knives are a way of representing the split between the characters and the cause of their division as a society. The knife also foreshadows the death of the two characters that kill each other in the end. The idea of the knife is also represented as a small object that can cause big damage and so this represents the idea that every little thing can cause big damage.. in a way, just the bride's actions although they might be little in some aspects such as the way she thinks, it can actually cause big damage. The knife is also use as a symbol of trouble. When the bridegroom tells his mother that he wants to take the knife with him to the vineyard, she gets startled and gets angry and says, "I don't know how you dare to carry a knife with you!" (6). She clearly sees the knife not only as a threat to her son, but also a threat to others. After her husband's and son's death due to the knife, she does not trust it and has an immediate hate against it.
Flowers and plants: In Act I Scene I, quite a few references are made to different kinds of flowers. The mother is the one that uses the reference to the flowers throughout the Act and this shows her love towards her husband and son. When she talks about them, she says, "Two men who were like two geraniums" and "A beautiful man, with life like a flower in his mouth" (6,7). The mother represents them as two innocent characters that are beautiful and innocent as flowers whose lives were taken away. The idea of flowers representing them is like the innocence in them and their beautiful and nice nature in life. Even when mother talks to her neighbor about his soon to be wife, she says "I wish they were like two thistles that would prick any wagging tongue that touched them" (14). I believe that when Mother says that, she is referring to her son's future wife and her son's future mother in law. She says it this way because she does not anyone to be talking about her son's future wife in a bad way, therefore she wants them to prick anything said about them so that she keeps everyone's thoughts pure about her son's future wife and his future mother in law. But this also foreshadows to the Bride because the Bride will be someone that pricks the entire family and wounds them. She is the one that will cause the tragedy in the book. The tone of the passage when Mother says that line seems somewhat sad and depressed which could also be foreshadowing to the tragedy in the end. Even the idea of weeds foreshadows the depressed feeling and the tragedy of the death because weeds are things that ruin the nice and beautiful flowers and plants, and therefore it could represent the idea of the Bride being a week and her son a flower, where the Bride ruins and causes the death of her son.
I found it interesting what you had to say on the flowers and I agree with you that there is a theme in the book with decay. To add to that I think that the characters are decaying of something like the flowers. This would be interesting to pay attention to during the second read.
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