59 pages • 1 hour read
Leif EngerPeace Like a River
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2001A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Representations of Evil
The concept of the eternal struggle between good and evil is approached in the book from a Christian perspective in which this conflict can also be viewed as that which is of God and that which is of the devil. Various symbols appear in the narrative that represent either the figure of the devil or evil itself, as the book’s young narrator conceptualizes evil through the world he sees.
The bandit Valdez in Swede’s Sunny Sundown poem is one such representation of evil. He adapts throughout the novel to help Swede, Reuben, and Davy understand the changing forms of evil they encounter in their lives, from Finch and Basca to a biased justice system to Jape Waltzer. Superintendent Holgren’s skin disorder, “his bedeviled complexion—that face set always at a rolling boil” (79), provides an example of how Leif Enger uses physical appearance to represent the evil aspect of human nature within an individual.
The little man with the skin bag in Reuben’s dreams, who steals Reuben’s breath, symbolizes the devil. Reuben describes him as a “devilish little man […] a pale one, a horror” (183). Because breath is life, given by God, stealing Reuben’s breath symbolizes the antithesis of God’s gift of life. In another dream Reuben enters this little man’s country, a place of despair that represents hell. It is paralleled in Reuben’s walking life by Waltzer’s cabin. The evil of this place is demonstrated symbolically by Reuben’s breathing improving as he gets further away from it. Waltzer represents the figure of the devil or the concept of evil in human form. His victims are numerous, but Jeremiah’s character shows the faithful are rewarded with eternal life, and thus good prevails in the end.
Biblical Symbolism
Many of the biblical allusions found in the narrative use symbolism to express Christian ideas about God and faith. The title of Chapter 2, “His Separate Shadow,” refers to Jeremiah’s shadow in the moonlight when Reuben observes him walking on air and indicates its symbolic significance. Shadows often symbolize the soul. Jeremiah’s shadow appears strangely separate from his physical form to signify both the separation of man from God and the separation of man’s worldly body, which is sinful, from his soul, which can be redeemed and have eternal life.
Jeremiah’s miracle with the bottomless pot of soup alludes to the biblical story in which Jesus fed a crowd of thousands by multiplying five loaves of bread and two fish. This allusion suggests the soup miracle symbolizes God’s generosity and abundance. Much of the language Reuben uses when considering Davy’s status as a fugitive reveals his exile as symbolic of an unredeemed sinner’s exile from Heaven. This fits with Davy being the only Land to find the idea of a fatherly God unappealing, believing life should be something undertaken on one’s own.
When the Lands leave August Schultz’s farm without a real plan for where to go next, Jeremiah compares their situation to the Israelites leaving Egypt and says they’ll travel by God’s guidance. Through such a comparison, their journey comes to symbolize faith in God’s guiding hand. Similarly, Swede’s comparison of their drive through Mandan without being seen by state troopers to Moses leading his people through the Red Sea establishes the event as a symbolic representation of deliverance from persecution.
Dreams
Reuben recounts his dreams time and again throughout the story. As a motif dreams demonstrate, often through symbolism, how he processes the world and the forces of good and evil he encounters in his coming-of-age journey. This in turn helps the reader gain a deeper understanding of the story’s messages. When Reuben is eager to spend his hard-earned Christmas money on himself, for example, he dreams of walking along a road picking up nuggets of gold, symbolizing the lure of greed.
Some of his dreams resemble the creature of nightmare archetype, in which a monster summoned from the darkest parts of the human psyche threatens the hero’s life. For Reuben, these creatures of nightmare represent feelings of guilt and shame, fear, and the presence of evil in the world. When he dreams of the bandit Valdez sneaking into his Airstream bunk, for example, he’s unable to get the words out to tell anyone. This is a manifestation of his fear and sense of powerlessness as he recognizes evil in his world. Dreams of the little man with the skin bag who steals his breath, and of Swede telling him asthmatic outlaws existed but rarely succeeded, similarly represent fear and helplessness.
When Reuben dreams he’s in the little man’s country, he has “the sense of walking through an old battlefield upon which the wrong side had prevailed” (237). This develops the concept of the eternal battle between good and evil, which plays out on a small scale throughout the narrative.
Breathing
Reuben’s asthma attacks recur throughout the narrative, forming a motif that supports the story’s thematic exploration of faith. Breathing in the book is not just a biological process, but a metaphor for life itself, which is viewed as a gift from God in the Land family’s Christian worldview. Asthma attacks often follow Reuben’s encounters with strong emotions like fear and guilt, encounters with evil, or with major change. They represent hardship, an inherent part of life for which Christian ideology offers Reuben guidance.
At times Reuben admits to feeling sorry for himself because of how his asthma limits him. He even responds with anger and jealousy on at least one occasion. Reuben’s knot, the major flaw that is overcome through the transformation of his character arc, is not his asthma, but how he sees himself because of it. Early in the book, he proclaims, “The weak must bank on mercy—without which, after all, I wouldn’t have lasted fifteen minutes. History simply hadn’t equipped me as it had Davy” (56). Eventually he learns the best thing isn’t to be strong and in full control, like Davy, but rather to put his faith in God’s protection. When he finally does this completely, his asthma is miraculously cured. This demonstrates Enger’s message that Christians should respond to life’s difficulties by having faith and seeking God’s will with the belief that he’ll do what’s best for them.
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