42 pages • 1 hour read
Gillian FlynnSharp Objects
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2006A 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
Sharp Objects
Sharp objects are found frequently throughout the novel as a way to demonstrate Camille’s inability to deal with heightened emotional states. Sharp objects represent an emotional release for Camille. For example, immediately after Camille’s mother tells her that she doesn’t love her, she stares at the knives in the knife drawer. While she doesn’t use the knives, the fact that she contemplates using them indicates that she can’t handle her emotional state. Of course, this is what ultimately led to her cutting in the first place—her inability to find a healthy outlet for the emotional pain that struggled to surface.
Another sharp object that represents a significant moment in the novel is when Camille talks about her college roommate. Her roommate’s mother gave her “a big plastic bag of safety pins that she thought might come in handy, and when they left for lunch, I surprised myself by bursting into tears” (96). Here, the safety pins, an object Camille had previously used to cut herself, are viewed as a symbol of love between a mother and daughter.
Alcohol
Alcohol, like the use of sharp objects, signifies Camille’s inability to cope with her reality and plays a large role throughout the novel. Although she has been previously sober after her stay in the psychiatric hospital, after her return to Wind Gap, she perpetually drinks. She justifies her drinking by saying that it helps lubricate her encounters with her mother, helps her forget her past, or helps her loosen up around Richard. However, knowing that her mother attempted to slowly poison her with medicine and that Camille drinks to the point of being sick, her overuse of alcohol can be symbolic of her attempt to recreate the onlyfeeling of love—albeit a harmful sort—she received from her mother.
Teeth
Teeth are used throughout the novel to symbolize the animalistic. In particular, Ann and Natalie, who both bite people to the point of harm, are described as wild and like animals. While both girls use their teeth to bite, like an animal, they also both end up murdered with their teeth being removed, like an animal that’s been hunted for a prize. This relates to Adora, whose room is floored with an elephant’s ivory. Adora tutored Ann and Natalie in an attempt to civilize or tame them, in the same way that she tried to tame Camille by making her sick and weak.
