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Joyce / The Old Woman
Joyce’s grandson and May’s best friend while she lives in Sydney. Initially, Johnny wants May to be his girlfriend, but after she briskly rejects him they become good friends; May even says he reminds her of her beloved brother, Billy. The two teenagers bond over their common interest in their Aboriginal heritage and spend afternoons daydreaming about life in traditional Aboriginal societies, fantasizing that such societies still exist and that one day they’ll be able to escape the Block and return to them. However, it’s May who has the courage to pursue this dream, while Johnny refuses to leave the Block; her determination contrasts with Johnny’s fatalism. At the end of the novel Johnny dies in an altercation with the police. While she mourns the loss of her friend, May is also relieved that he died with his dreams intact, without discovering that the life they always dreamed of doesn’t exist.
Johnny Quotes in Swallow the Air
The Swallow the Air quotes below are all either spoken by Johnny or refer to Johnny. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
11. Wantok Quotes
He takes my hand like always and we scramble up the palms and hack down coconuts with a machete, we run down to the rocky beaches and cast off our canoe, we fish all day, following the reefs and tides and winds […] We rest in the houses as warm tropical storms light up the bruised sky.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
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Johnny Character Timeline in Swallow the Air
The timeline below shows where the character Johnny appears in Swallow the Air. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
9. The Block
...her toughened and more mature. She lives with Joyce, Joyce’s daughter Justine, and Justine’s son Johnny. At night, Joyce and other neighborhood women stay up late playing card games and drinking...
(full context)
11. Wantok
In the midst of all her worries, when May spends time with Johnny, she can escape to daydreams of beautiful beaches where they can pick fruit and live...
(full context)
When May first arrived at Joyce’s house, Johnny tried to flirt with her, informing her one day that she was his girlfriend. May...
(full context)
Johnny tells May all the stories about the Torres Strait he’s heard from visiting uncles. There,...
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When Johnny and May return to Joyce’s house after these long talks, they feel immune to the...
(full context)
12. Painted Dreaming
...onto the city with her. When she wakes up, she knows she has to find Johnny and get out of this city, where the people are “only faintly dreaming.”
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In Joyce’s house, May finds Johnny smoking a bong. He laughs when he finds she has been arrested, telling her she’s...
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Angry, May yells at Johnny that he’s not going to change or move for anyone’s sake, not even his own....
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18. Country
...the ride. Its brightly lit aisles remind May of the Block. Just then, she sees Johnny’s face on the front of a newspaper, under the headline “BOY, 16, DIES IN POLICE...
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May feels that she can’t really cry for Johnny because of the angry way in which they parted. At least, she thinks, he died...
(full context)
