38 pages • 1 hour read
Kiran Millwood HargraveThe Mercies
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2020A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Symbols & Motifs
Ships/Boats
The Mercies takes place by the sea, highlighting the importance of ships and boats. Ships and boats are literal survival mechanisms for the communities in Finnmark. Boats help people fish and provide food to their community, while ships help transport people between disparate communities that the unforgiving landscape would otherwise keep separate. Ships and boats are also symbols. With fishing a traditionally male-dominated industry, Kirsten’s seizure of the fishing boats subverts gender roles and transforms a masculine space into an equal one; she too can fish and row, so she is just as strong and valuable as any man. Ships hold a different connotation. The ship brings foreigners to Vardø—people like Absalom, who do not appreciate Vardø’s people and customs. Thus, the ship symbolizes imperialism, colonialism, and the arrival of dangerously dogmatic thinking.
Storm
The novel opens with a horrifying storm that swiftly kills all the men of Vardø. This storm is based on historical records of a real 1617 storm, but the fictional storm symbolizes grief, the terror of nature, and the unpredictability of life. Though the community of Vardø has learned to deal with the changing moods of the sea, this storm is the worst anyone has ever seen. It’s so enormous and devastating that the grief and confusion it brings plant dangerous seeds in the minds of its survivors: With only a 17th-century understanding of nature, many of the women are happy to believe that Kirsten used witchcraft to cause the storm. Grief and terror therefore propel the women into scapegoating.
The storm also symbolizes the broader unpredictability of life. In Christian religious thinking, only God has the power to determine who lives and who dies; it is difficult for people such as Toril to imagine that the storm could be a random occurrence. The storm thus fuels the religious dogmatism that grips the town. Lastly, the storm symbolizes the darkness that hides in every individual. Though the literal storm was devastating, the way in which human beings storm against one another is far worse.
The Kirke
The kirke—Norwegian for “church”—is a physical space that doubles as a symbol for unity and division. The kirke is a central setting for towns and villages: Even tiny Vardø has a sizable kirke. The kirke is where people go for religious services, but also for town meetings and community connection. The presence of the kirke reveals that Vardø had religious ideas before Absalom’s arrival. However, refusing to go to Kirke becomes a damning sign when Absalom comes to Vardø and twists religion to suit his own beliefs and desire for power. Thus, the kirke becomes a symbol of patriarchal religious authority. The kirke is meant to unify the people of a town, but ultimately it divides them as well.
