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Prologue: Island
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Island of Missing Trees, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Generational Trauma
Nature and Interconnectedness
Love and Displacement
Solidarity, Tribalism, and Political Division
History and Silencing
Summary
Analysis
Ada Kazantzakis, 16, sits in her usual seat at the back of her classroom in North London. All of the other students are excited for the holidays to start, but Ada is ambivalent. Ever since her mom died, her dad, Kostas Kazantzakis, has retreated further into his work (in botany and evolutionary ecology). Kostas hasn’t made any plans for them for the vacation. Ada thinks he’ll undoubtedly work the whole time, and she’ll be left to her own devices, alone. She doesn’t understand her father’s obsession with plants and wishes that he would be normal, like the parents of other students. But unlike those parents, Kostas seems to prefer trees to people.
From Ada’s perspective, Kostas eschews spending time with people in favor of plants and trees. Even from the little information Ada gives, though, the novel establishes that, along with Ada, Kostas may also be struggling with profound grief, following the death of his wife Defne, Ada’s mom. Kostas’s decision to retreat into his work, then, is as much of a coping mechanism he has developed in response to grief as it is a reflection of his preferences.
Active
Themes
In class, Ada’s teacher, Mrs. Walcott, gives the students an assignment. Over the break, they should interview a family member for a project about “migration and generational change.” Ada imagines that Mrs. Walcott has been sad and alone since her husband died a few years ago. Ada feels like she can sense when others are sad “the way one animal [can] smell another of its kind a mile away.” Ada worries about the assignment. She doesn’t know any relatives on either her mom's or dad’s side of the family. She knows that her parents and their families lived in Cyprus and that, in her mother’s language, her name, Ada, means island. But that’s about all she knows.
Through Mrs. Walcott’s assignment, the novel reveals one of its major themes: migration and generational change. Ada also shows that she is going through her own experience of profound grief in this section. She thinks that, like an animal recognizing its kind, she can sense the sadness of others. Ada’s thought doesn’t necessarily imply that grief is “animalistic” but instead shows that humans, like other animals (as well as plants), communicate in ways that don’t rely on language.
Active
Themes
In class, Mrs. Walcott asks Ada if she agrees with another student’s statement that it is always women who “cling to […] souvenirs and knick-knacks from the past.” Ada isn’t prepared for the question. After she regains her composure, she says she doesn’t agree because her father likes to collect things. When Mrs. Walcott asks what he collects, Ada says, “Plants” and that he also enjoys spending time with trees, especially his fig tree. Students in class laugh. Mrs. Walcott thanks Ada and says she can sit down, but Ada feels paralyzed and doesn’t move. Mrs. Walcott asks again, but Ada still doesn’t move. Later, Ada thinks that things could have stayed the way they were if she had just sat down when asked, instead of doing what she did next.
