Assignment 5 Question 3 Julia Burnett

Explore the significance/symbolism of the Devon River (you may have to refer to earlier readings to supplement your answer)

The Devon River, which runs beside the Devon school, symbolizes innocence and purity and is yet another way the author, John Knowles, uses nature to describe Gene’s relationship with the war. The Devon River is a clear, freshwater way that is hidden by a row of trees and bushes separating it from the school. The boys, who have grown up at the Devon School, have been shielded from the horrors occurring in the world, just as the trees shield the river. Gene and his friends had played in the Devon River ever since they were young, every year moving further upstream. As Gene reflects, “ We were still calmly, numbly reading Virgil and playing tag farther downstream” (Knowles 15). Although the river is safe and inviting, it abruptly turns into a waterfall, plummeting into the “turbid” Naguamsett River. At the time, the Devon School was not only educating its students, but also preparing them to fight in World War II, and, as they got older, they got closer and closer to being drafted. Every year the boys venture further upstream, getting closer to the waterfall, and to the age that would make them eligible to join the Army. The Naguamsett River, which merges via a waterfall with the Devon River is cluttered with seaweed and marshland, clouded with mud and pungent with the smell of sulfur. It leads to the ocean with a strong outward current. Gene’s opinion of the state of the river is not fond, as he describes it as, “ugly, saline, fringed with marsh, mud and seaweed…governed by unimaginable factors like the Gulf Stream, the Polar Ice Cap, and the moon” (Knowles 76). The rough state of the water is very much like the exterior of a soldier, wounded and bloody. The affect that strong outside forces, such as the moon, have on the current of the river is very much like the affect of war and battle on the mind of a soldier, controlling it and taking over its power to think independently or positively. As Gene said, “ The Devon School was astride these two rivers” showing that the school was caught between letting the boys remain pure and innocent, shielding them from the terrors of the world, and preparing them to serve their country overseas (Knowles 76). As Gene enters senior year, John Knowles describes the threatening reality of a future at war for Gene and his classmates. The Devon River, which ends in a waterfall to the “turbid” Naguamsett River, represents the childhood and future of the Devon schoolboys, who were hidden from the horrors of the war and negative influences in order to remain pure and innocent, even though the threat of a future at war was beginning to shatter the naiveté of their childhood.