John Purcell Symbolism

Furthermore, John Purcell is shown to be very inattentive in Johnny's life, creating a wall between the two. John's lack of involvement in Johnny's life is clearly shown throughout the story and John admits that "most of the time he was too preoccupied with other things to pay much heed to the boy's activities". At the banquet, Johnny shows John the Cree mask Johnny made which made John "felt an immeasurable loss as he realized he had not even enquired what the boy was doing all those long evenings in the basement." The fine Cree mask symbolizes the barrier between John and his son; Furthermore, the tremendous amount of work that had gone into the mask represents that the barrier will not be easily broken. Instead of spending more time with