Skip to main content

In Hatchet, how did the sight of the kingfisher awaken Brian to a new source of food?

The sight of the kingfisher awakens Brian to the idea that he, too, can attempt to catch and eat fish:



Sitting on one limb was a blue bird with a crest and sharp beak, a kingfisher—he thought of a picture he had seen once—which left the branch while he watched and dove into the water. It emerged a split part of a second later. In its mouth was a small fish, wiggling silver in the sun. It took the fish to a limb, juggled it twice, and swallowed it whole.


Fish.


Of course, he thought. There were fish in the lake and they were food. And if a bird could do it...



This happens in Chapter 11. Up until this point, Brian has been eating small berries, which were tart and hard to chew, as well as eggs, which were unpleasantly greasy and oily.


He craves the kind of food he'd eaten regularly, thoughtlessly, at home: hot dogs at a cookout, turkey at a Thanksgiving dinner. It's clear that Brian craves more nutrition than his current strategies are yielding, and he'll need to learn to fish if he wants bigger portions of food with more protein.


You might wonder why it takes so long for Brian to realize that fish are a good source of food. Hasn't he been close to the lake this whole time? Yes. But don't judge him too harshly. He's never had to survive on his own before, and he's constantly dealing with problems--like the fruit that made him violently ill, and the porcupine that injures him.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Is 'efficate' a word in English?

I routinely hear the word "efficate" being used. For example, "The most powerful way to efficate a change in the system is to participate." I do not find entries for this word in common English dictionaries, but I do not have an unabridged dictionary. I have checked the OED (I'm not sure if it is considered unabridged), and it has no entry for "efficate". It does have an entry for "efficiate", which is used in the same way. Wordnik has an entry for "efficate" with over 1800 hits, thus providing some evidence for the frequency of use. I personally like the word and find the meaning very clear and obvious when others use it. If it's not currently an "officially documented" word, perhaps its continued use will result in it being better documented.
Post a Comment
Read more