Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes.

Ghosts

Ghosts appear throughout the novel, representing strength or comfort. As the story opens, Isabel tries in vain to get Momma’s ghost to present itself as Momma herself. In Chapter IV, as she travels to New York on the Hartsborn, Isabel states that ghosts cannot cross the water, which means that the ancestors in Africa could not help the slaves in America. The ghosts of Momma and Poppa appear when Isabel is branded, wrapping their arms around her. As she rows across the river in the final chapter, ghosts “tugged [her] boat with all their strength,” aiding Isabel in her journey toward freedom. The ghosts of her parents and ancestors are benign, never frightening, and Isabel welcomes and embraces them.

Nature as Metaphor

Anderson often uses description of natural settings and details to mirror or foreshadow mood, character, or plot. For example, in Chapter I, when Isabel begs her Momma’s ghost to cross back over and give her some guidance, robins swoop through the trees and black butterflies appear through a cloud of bugs, suggesting that Momma is there, all around her, even though Isabel doesn’t know it. In Chapter XVI, after Isabel has stolen the list of conspirators from Lockton’s drawer, she observes that the air is as hot as if the city were wrapped in a blanket, suggesting the high risk she takes and foreshadowing the wool blanket she covers Curzon with when they escape. In Chapter XXI, when Madam demands that Isabel be returned and punished, a crow pecks at a carcass near the water’s edge and then flies away, just as Madam pecks at Isabel’s freedom. As she is branded, Isabel notices dandelions growing in the mud, suggesting that beauty can blossom in the harshest of places. An alert reader will notice these uses of nature as metaphor, for they enrich and deepen the narrative.

Dreams

Isabel’s dreams foreshadow the future and reveal the truth. In Chapter XXI, as she sleeps soundly because she has been drugged, Isabel dreams of standing on a sandy beach at night with an enormous map at her feet, calling for Ruth. The roads of the map become twisted eels with amber eyes that slither into the water. The dream comes immediately true when she wakes and realizes that Ruth is gone for real. The dream also suggests the final scene of the novel where Isabel overcomes danger and crosses the water. After her branding, Isabel dreams of old people who look somewhat like her parents who help her sleep and smell like lemons. They comfort her in her unconsciousness, and portend the ancestors who help her as she rows in the final scene.