Water imagery is used by McEwan throughout the book. Many scenes that are essential to the story involve normal water, like at the fountain and Lola's rape, which happens next to a lake. Robbie and the rest of the soldiers are traveling to get to the seaside at Dunkirk. Often, images of drinking water represent cleansing; a character cleaning himself or herself to realize cleanliness. Robbie and Briony, vital character types to the book, 're normally associated with images of normal water. Additionally, they are the two individuals that might hold the most for which to atone; Robbie handles needing to leave Cecilia and being the explanation for her cutting ties with her family, while Briony seeks forgiveness and retribution for her false accusation of Robbie in Lola's rape. Consequently, images of drinking water as cleansing or the work of cleansing with water are often associated with Briony and Robbie. In part three, for example, Briony becomes a nurse. She washes her hands extensively, sanitizes the hospital, and cleans the wounds of wounded patients. Robbie also desires water, but in other ways. When he and his team are heading towards Dunkirk in the retreat, he is not only constantly thirsty with very limited access to drinking water, but also uses normal water as a cleansing device. After he takes shelter from a bomb in a dirt and grime field, he makes an attempt to wash the dirt out of his mouth with drinking water. He also endeavors to sanitize and clean his wound. Water is a constant and important existence through the whole plot of Atonement.
Water can be used in Atonement to symbolize atonement or obtaining forgiveness for your activities. It connotes freshness, purity, and clean newness, much like forgiveness does indeed. The OED identifies atonement as "The health of being at one with others; unity of sense, harmony, concord, agreement" (OED, "atonement", n). This also facilitates the thought of atonement being like drinking water. We as humans are at one with water; it is at us, around us, in the air, and essential to your life. Atonement is also essential because most seek forgiveness for wrong that they've done. Out of this we can attract the conclusion that it is associated with atonement. Briony and Robbie will be the two main personas that have sins they need to atone for, and McEwan uses normal water imagery involved with them throughout the book. Clearly, drinking water is something that is essential to life, and it is seen as attractive in Atonement: in part two, Robbie is perpetually thirsty and searching for drinking water, and Briony partly three uses it to wash her hands frequently. The importance of atonement is also seen in the name - if the novel is called Atonement, it is an important theme. Atonement, like drinking water, is generally seen as desired because people always desire to be forgiven because of their sins and also to repent for their actions.
Cleansing images concerning normal water often follow a predicament where a character does indeed something sinful, encouraging the thought of water being cleansing element in Atonement. Normal water can be seen as purifying both in a moral sense and a more tangible sense. Cleaning in the sense of morality is connected to atonement. Briony has possibly the biggest guilt to atone for, having accused Robbie of rape when she recognized he was innocent. Therefore, when she washes her "cracked and bleeding chilblained hands under freezing drinking water, " she may be seeking to wash herself of the guilt she retains because of her sin. Her attempts at detoxification aren't working - her regular handwashing, "a dozen times each day", only leaves her hands chapped and bloody. The therapeutic she wishes from the detoxification is impossible and her hands stay cracked. In the same way, the cracked foundation she brought on in her sister and Robbie's life and romantic relationship together stay as well. At a healthcare facility, Briony attempts to detox and repair others as a nurse. She cleans and dresses the wounds of military and brings them drinking water to drink. Because Robbie is a soldier himself, it begs the question as to whether Briony is offering the wounded troops water and cleaning their wounds in an attempt to atone for her sins. Her shame brings her to this career as a nurse where she takes care of troops, perhaps representing her wish to help Robbie. On top of that, Briony and her fellow nurses are often shown cleaning the hospital equipment in a nearly obsessive manner: "The day-to-day practice of boiling, scrubbing, buffing, and wiping became the badge of the students' professional delight. " This frequent washing, a source of pride, perhaps will distract herself from her guilt; she actually is attempting to clean away her guilt with normal water. Furthermore, her chosen career could be interpreted as self-given punishment. Life on the ward is a tight and difficult one - now she actually is the main one taking purchases and serving others, which is a stark contrast to her earlier life. Area of the reason youthful Briony was so dislikeable was due to her controlling and selfish frame of mind. The tales she created were about her and she used and directed others to experiment with into those testimonies. Just how she uses drinking water to completely clean both herself among others represents that she is seeking atonement and desires desperately on her behalf sins to be forgiven.
Robbie's water purifying also represents his desire for forgiveness also to atone for his sins. He makes an attempt to use normal water to clean, disinfect, and maybe treat the wound he received in struggle; he washes away the crusty blood, not only to clean the region, but to clean away the blood that reminds him of the violence he's experienced. Even when he doesn't have any drinking water, McEwan still affiliates normal water with Robbie's detoxification: "[Robbie] sat and thought about water and tried out to completely clean his tongue against his sleeve", after working for cover from a fallen shell and abandoning a female who, too paralyzed with fear, refused to get cover for her and her young boy. Immediately after, he discovers that they died when he observed only a charred gap where that they had been before. When he finally confirms drinking water later, he realizes he shouldn't waste any that might be quenching his thirst by rinsing his oral cavity and drank the dirt and grime with the murky water, perhaps to cleansing himself of the horror of what he'd just seen. Later, Robbie uses normal water to wash his face, "changing this particular to rusty brown". In such a passing, McEwan is making it clear that Robbie was successful at cleansing his face, since the dirt is no longer on his face, it's in the. Perhaps he has efficiently achieved atonement.
Although our personas attempt to use water as a purifying device, normal water is not actually utilized well for purifying in the book Atonement. Briony attempts over and over to clean away her sins, as shown in her perpetual palm washing, but they aren't ever clean enough because she can never stop washing them. Her attempts to atone on her behalf sins aren't effective, as she never really washes her hands of her guilt and the damage she has inflicted on other folks, like Robbie and her sister. Evidence of this is visible in her chapped and chilblained hands, a painful representation of her sin. Although Robbie's cleaning attempts might become more successful than Briony's, he too is unable to wipe away his activities and their repercussions. Although he is able to wash the dirt from his face, it lingers in water, turning it darkish and turbid. We know that the cleaning of his wound failed, as he died from the resulting infection. However, McEwan writes, "When he was done he believed a nice lightness in the air around him which slipped silkily over his skin area and through his nostrils" (226).
McEwan argues that no matter how desperately someone would like to atone because of their actions, their attempts at atonement are futile and true atonement is not possible. Water, like change, is an ever-present substance inside our lives. Someone's actions and the subsequent effects remain forever, seen in data that drinking water doesn't always truly cleanse. Although atonement is desired, it's not realistic. When Robbie washes his face and dirties this particular, it signifies that his sins and problems will always be with him. Although they are gone from his face, they won't truly disappear completely. He cannot change days gone by, but only move forward. Also, Briony cannot change her past either, around she hopes she could take back the terrible thing she do. Her anxious want for atonement is shown in her job as a nurse where she must provide others and help wounded military, but this still does not make up for days gone by; she cannot achieve atonement. This is can be seen as she washes her hands thoroughly to no avail, they should never be truly clean. Similarly, she cannot make her recent truly clean because her sins will always be there, as will her remembrances of the horrible things she has seen in a healthcare facility. We simply check out her natural and chapped hands as a reminder that her sins, stories, and past are still with her. Her sins continue to be with her and cannot be healed.
Even if we can not change days gone by and cannot truly achieve atonement, as seen in Ian McEwan's Atonement through images of normal water, that doesn't signify we can not change our actions in the foreseeable future. A few words from Paul Boese illustrate this well: "Forgiveness does not change the past, but it can enlarge the future. " It is impossible to attain atonement and change days gone by, but we can progress. We see this also in Atonement - although Robbie had not been given the change to move forward along with his future, Briony told the story of her wrongdoings in a book for millions to learn. The story Atonement functions as a lesson for the future not to duplicate mistakes that cannot be reversed even if true atonement can't be achieved.
Kathleen Plant
