Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in A Tale for the Time Being, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Time, Impermanence, and the Present
The Difficulty of Communication
Life vs. Death
Coincidences and Connections
Sexual Perversion and Violence
Summary
Analysis
(1) Ruth watches a TV interview of a Japanese man, Mr. Nojima, who stands amid the wreckage left by the tsunami and speaks of how his family—his wife, little daughter, and infant son—were all washed away. Mr. Nojima tried to grab them, but the water pushed him away, and their house broke apart. He sounds hopeless and says that he will probably never find his family, or even their remains.
Mr. Nojima’s tragic story demonstrates that change—as represented by the tsunami—can be powerful and destructive. His family is most likely dead, his house is destroyed, and the entire town is in shambles. As Ruth watches this video, she must be worried about Nao, since she assumes that Nao’s lunch box was washed into the sea during the tsunami.
Themes
(2) Right after the tsunami and earthquake, Ruth w been mesmerized by videos of the disaster—she watched entire towns being destroyed in just a few moments. Many of these videos had been shot on people’s cellphones, and it often seemed like those recording didn’t quite understanding what they were filming. From the vantage point of the camera, it was easy to tell that the wave was fast and immense, and that the “tiny people didn’t stand a chance.”
The tsunami is that of a huge wave that quickly and powerfully sweeps away people and towns in its path—it is so powerful that “tiny people” could never stop it. The tsunami symbolizes the inevitability of change—just as it’s useless to try to escape such an enormous natural disaster, it’s futile to resist change in one’s life.
Themes
(3) For a while, after the tsunami in Japan, the news was full of this tragedy. However, with time, other stories from around the world occupied the news cycle.
Like everything else, the news, too, is a “time being.” It’s impermanent and ever-changing, as it adapts to the continuous changes happening in the world.
Themes
(4) Ruth spent her afternoon looking for the video of Nao’s funeral on the internet, but she didn’t find it. Ruth feels like she really needs to know if Nao is alive. She telephones Callie to have her inspect the barnacles on the plastic freezer bag, so that Ruth can get a better idea of when the package ended up in the ocean.
Ruth is worried that Nao is dead, and her desperation to find out to what happened speaks to the deep connection she’s formed with Nao through the diary. In finding out more about the barnacles on the freezer bag, Ruth hopes to figure out if it was indeed washed away in the tsunami.
Themes
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(5) Callie, a marine biologist who volunteers at a marine mammal protection agency, says that it’s hard for her to predict the exact age of the barnacle colony on the plastic bag—but she thinks they are fairly young. Her best guess is that this colony of barnacles has been floating around for at least two years, and more likely for around three or four years. Ruth is disappointed to hear this, because if the barnacles are three years or older, they would be older than the tsunami. This would negate her theory about the contents of the lunch box being washed to her by the tsunami.
Ruth probably hopes that the lunch box was washed to her in the tsunami because that would mean there’s hope that Nao herself experienced and survived the disaster. On the other hand, Ruth might think that if Nao threw the lunch box into the ocean years before the tsunami, it is more likely that Nao killed herself.
Themes
(6) That night, Ruth has a second dream about the Japanese nun. This time, the nun sees Ruth and offers her thick glasses to her. When Ruth puts them on, she finds she cannot see through them. As Ruth experiences “a feeling of nonbeing,” she brings her hands to her face to pull off the glasses. However, she no longer has a face—there is no Ruth. She is terrified as she feels like she’s dissolving into something eternal and unnamable. However, she feels a gentle touch, after which her terror is replaced by calm. Ruth feels like time itself is cradling her in its arms.
In her second vivid and vaguely supernatural dream, Ruth seems to meet Jiko, who helps Ruth experience her own impermanence and also her connection to everything else across time and space. Ruth is terrified at first—but with Jiko’s help, she realizes that it is actually comforting to lose her individuality and feel connected with everything.
Themes
