The Shipping News Chapters 31–33 Summary & Analysis

Summary

Chapter 31: Sometimes You Just Lose It

In the newsroom, Quoyle is writing a story about a ship that collided into an island after the man on watch fell asleep. Tert Card comes in, enraged at the cold weather. He talks about heading down to Florida. The men begin swapping potential news stories. Per usual, the stories are all perverse. Billy Pretty and Nutbeem have more stories of sexually abhorrent men stripping in court. Nutbeem is planning his departure, preparing to sail down to the Caribbean. Billy Pretty suggests that Quoyle will probably be the next to leave, but Quoyle confirms that he is in Newfoundland to stay. In response, Billy Pretty remarks that he does not believe a man can raise two girls on his own.

Chapter 32: The Hairy Devil

Nutbeem is scheduled to depart Newfoundland in accordance with a waxing moon. The local men are all getting together for a party in his trailer. The party is a raucous affair, with everyone drinking too much. Tert Card tells Quoyle the story of the "hairy devil." Tert Card's father lost a friend one night in the snow. When the father followed the friend's tracks, they led to a hole spiraling downward. All of a sudden, a "hairy devil" with red eyes jumps from behind Tert's father into the hole, telling him he will come back for him.

The party begins to get rowdy, and a black-haired man suggests they all go down to Nutbeem's boat, and destroy it so that Nutbeem will not be able to leave them. Quoyle, in his drunkenness, watches the mob, and feels nothing but his own loneliness—he is left out of the action once again. The boat is destroyed to the point that it sinks into the water. Meanwhile, Quoyle wanders over to Wavey's home, and looks in the window to see her playing with Herry. Quoyle ends up staying the night in a hotel room.

Chapter 33: The Cousin

In the morning, Quoyle returns to Beety and Dennis's house, where he was supposed to spend the night, and cannot recall anything from the night before. Quoyle then goes back to the house on the point to pick up some things. He feels eerie there all alone, and finds knotted twine on the thresholds of his children's rooms. Knowing that this is a cruel trick played by Quoyle's old cousin Nolan. Quoyle immediately heads up to Capsize Cove to find him. The old hermit is a madman living in fishing grime and stench. Quoyle sees a white dog first, and then recognizes the family resemblance in the old man. Without a fight, Quoyle drops the twine, which the man throws in the fire.

Quoyle then goes down to help Alvin Yard finish Quoyle's boat, and after that, to go see about Nutbeem's boat. The men have been unsuccessful in resurrecting the boat from its destruction. Nutbeem decides he will go to Brazil, and tells the men about all the good food he hopes to eat. Everyone feels bad about the circumstances with the boat.

Analysis

Tert Card's story of the hairy devil reflects his own demonic character, and also foreshadows the tragic destruction of Nutbeem's boat. From the beginning, Tert Card is described as a devil, and his story suggests that the association comes from his family history. The hairy devil, with his red eyes and hole beneath ground, promises he will come back for Tert Card's father—it seems the devil did come back in the form of possessing Tert Card. The reader should note that Tert Card is the first to the party, symbolically (though not literally) leading the force that will take down Nutbeem's boat. The story of the hairy devil foreshadows this mob scene. The party takes place on a night when the moon is waxing—a fuller moon symbolizes the potential for madness and savagery. When Quoyle stumbles out walking, he notices that the moon's reflection looked like a hole in the ocean, or like the hole where the hairy devil lived. Nutbeem's boat breaks and falls into the sea, symbolically down the hairy devil's hole.

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