Throughout Past the Shallows, the Curren family copes with the deaths of beloved family members Mum, Uncle Nick, and Granddad. Harry, Miles and Joe are told that Mum died in a car accident and that Uncle Nick drowned on the same night. It is gradually implied, however, that Mum and Uncle Nick were having an affair, and that Dad has been lying about the night of the accident and the circumstances of Nick’s death. The losses of these characters and the secrets and blame associated with their deaths have varying effects on the rest of the family. The Curren brothers are grief-stricken, Aunty Jean is resentful, and Dad is tortured by the blame he places on Mum for cheating on him. Additionally, he is wracked with the guilt of tampering with Nick’s body at the scene of the car crash and lying about his brother-in-law’s fate, knowing that he did not actually drown. The dissolution of the Curren family as they cope with losing three of their loved ones suggests that assigning blame after a tragedy is destructive and unproductive, as it will only breed resentment and betrayal.
In reaction to the deaths of her sister, husband, and father, Aunty Jean spirals into a vicious cycle of bitterness and blaming others that leads to the destruction of her relationships with Dad, Harry, Miles, and Joe. After Uncle Nick’s death, Aunty Jean forces Dad to take out a loan in order to buy Nick’s share of the family boat, which puts a significant strain on their relationship. Although she does not know that Nick actually died in the crash with Mum, nor does she know the full extent of Dad’s involvement, she blames Dad anyway because she believes that he encouraged Nick to go out on the boat on the night that he allegedly drowned. This bitterness destroys the rapport between Aunty Jean and Dad to the point that she refuses to even enter the family home.
The resentment Aunty Jean feels for Dad in the wake of Uncle Nick’s death also spills over into her relationships with Harry, Miles, and Joe. After Granddad passes away and leaves his house to Joe, Aunty Jean contests the will and takes back the house to sell it, a betrayal that causes an unforgivable rift between her and the Curren brothers, who are sentimentally attached to their grandfather’s home. Although Granddad wanted Joe to have the house, Aunty Jean feels that Joe is stealing the property that she believes to be rightfully hers as Granddad’s daughter. Aunty Jean’s shift in character suggests that assigning blame in the midst of tragedy can devastate both the individual and the family.
Like Aunty Jean, Dad also experiences a profound change in character after the deaths of Mum and Uncle Nick. While Dad’s descent into violence is initially presented as a reaction to the loss of his wife and brother-in-law, it is eventually revealed that his self-blame surrounding the circumstances of their deaths is what fuels the rage that destroys his relationships with Harry, Miles, and Joe. Near the end of the novel, it is implied that Mum and Uncle Nick were having an illicit relationship, and that Harry (and possibly Joe) are actually Nick’s biological sons rather than Dad’s. Dad confesses to Miles that Mum was leaving him (with Nick, Harry, and Miles in the car) on the night of the accident, and that he “had to take [Nick] away” from the scene of the crash in order to prevent people from finding out about Mum’s infidelity. Dad’s full involvement in Nick and Mum’s deaths remains something of a mystery for his sons, as well as for the reader, clouded by the secrets that he has long kept from his family. In the context of Dad’s alcoholism-fueled abuse throughout the story, this revelation shows how grief, secrecy, and guilt form a destructive combination. In this case, Dad blames himself more than anyone else, but that blame still has devastating consequences.
Dad’s destructiveness culminates at the end of the novel when he pins the blame for Mum leaving on Harry and throws the young boy overboard from the fishing boat in a fit of rage. Harry drowns to death in the ocean as a result of Dad’s unbearable guilt, an action that epitomizes Dad’s desperate attempts to rid himself of self-blame but ultimately proves to be futile and deeply destructive. Whereas Aunty Jean destroys her relationships by focusing on blame, Dad literally destroys his own son.
While the dysfunction that plagues the Curren family initially appears to be rooted in grief over the deaths of Mum, Uncle Nick, and Granddad, the true insidious nature of the family’s dissolution becomes apparent as they begin to point fingers at one another. The gradual destruction of the relationships among Dad, Aunty Jean, and the Curren brothers reveals that hasty accusations in the face of tragedy are not just unhelpful, but also extremely harmful. Yet unlike other members of the Curren family, Miles and Joe maintain their sense of loyal solidarity by placing due responsibility on Dad as an oppressor, rather than allowing their struggles and grief to strain the close bond they share.
Related Themes from Other Texts
Tragedy and Blame ThemeTracker
Tragedy and Blame Quotes in Past the Shallows
Harry picked up an abalone shell, the edges loose and dusty in his hands. And every cell in his body stopped. Felt it. This place. Felt the people who had been here before, breathing and standing live where he stood. People who were dead now. Long gone. And Harry understood it, right down in his guts, that time ran on forever and that one day he would die.
First day of school holidays. First day he must man the boat alone while the men go down. Old enough now, he must take his place. Just like his brother before him, he must fill the gap Uncle Nick left.
He used to feel sorry for the abs when he was young. The way they pulsed and moved in the tubs, sensing the bright light and heat. But he couldn’t think about them like that now. He was only careful not to cut or bruise them, because once abs started to bleed, they kept on bleeding until all the liquid inside was gone. They just dried up and died.
It was fully formed, more than half a yard long, maybe only days away from being born. It would have survived if Jeff had just let it go, let it slide off the back of the boat. It had made it this far, battling its siblings, killing and feeding off them. Waiting. It would have been born strong, ready to hunt, ready to fight.
“Don’t you get stuck here with your dad,” he said. “Don’t you let him…You’re too young to be out there working, Miles. It’s not right.”
Miles felt the words sink down right inside him.
“You’ve had it rough enough,” he said.
“What am I meant to do? What am I meant to do?”
And he heard her voice rise up, familiar tears.
“I grew up in that house, Miles. Don’t I deserve something?”
But Harry stayed where he was. He stayed among the piles of Granddad’s things left on the lawn—all the things that were no longer needed, no longer useful—and he wished that Joe would stay.
Maybe that’s why Joe and Miles liked it so much. And he knew that Granddad would have taken him. It was just that he was too little, too small to go, when Granddad had been alive. And if Granddad hadn’t died then he definitely would have taken Harry fishing, too. And it would have been good, like this was.
Then they heard Dad yelling from inside. Yelling at them, at everyone. Yelling at no one. And Miles could hear the words. They came through the brown walls, through the air, and cracked open the night: “I never wanted you.”
He just kept starting at Harry. And his hand moved away from Harry’s hair, moved down to the string around his neck. And he cupped it in his palm—a white pointer’s tooth.
“It’s his,” he said, and his face went pale. “His.”
He let the tooth go. He stared down at Harry.
“She was leaving, because of him. Because of you.”
There was a black emptiness inside him and it was all that he could see. He tried to imagine a fire in the darkness, and at first it was just one blue flame too small to feel. But he willed it on, felt the first flicker of warmth as it grew. Then it raged, turned into a ball of fire, orange and red and hungry. It devoured his stomach, moved up to his lungs, his back. Moved into his heart. He shared it with Harry through his skin.
He had been drifting for a lifetime and his mind had lost its way. It was dissolving and he had forgotten about Harry, forgotten about all the things that came before. There was only this vastness, the swing of a giant pendulum—water receding then flooding back. And he was part of it. Part of the deep water, part of the waves. Part of the rocks and reefs along the shore.
He listened to Joe talk about all the places they would go, the tropical islands and clear warm water, the big bright lights of new cities. The free open space of ocean. And he knew that Joe was going to take him with him, now. Wherever he went. He leaned his head down against his brother’s shoulder. And he let himself cry.
Miles let the rip that ran with the bluff carry him. He enjoyed the ride, felt his hands slipping through the cool water, body floating free. And there was this feeling in him like when it had all just been for fun, the water.
And Miles loved that light.
It made the dark water sparkle, turned the white spray golden—made the ocean a giant mirror reflecting the sky. Even the leaves on the crack wattle shone in the light.
It made everything come to life.
Out past the shallows, past the sandy-bottomed bays, comes the dark water—black and cold and roaring. Rolling out an invisible path, a new line for them to follow.
To somewhere warm.
To somewhere new.
