Childhood and Maturity
“Through the Tunnel” is the story of Jerry, a young boy who is training to make a physical passage through an underwater tunnel, but it is also a story about a boy preparing (unbeknown to him) to make the passage from childhood into young adulthood. As the story opens, in the time before Jerry has attempted to swim beneath the rock and through the tunnel, he is still a boy. By the time…
read analysis of Childhood and Maturity
Solitude vs. Community
From the story’s first sentence, when Jerry’s attention is split between going to the crowded beach with his mother or to the rocky bay by himself, Lessing creates a sharp contrast between solitude and community. Throughout the story, Jerry seems to be privately weighing the burdens and benefits of being surrounded by others in a community against the difficulties—and, he discovers, the joys—of being alone.
Although Jerry decides to explore the isolated strip of…
read analysis of Solitude vs. Community
Nature
Aside from a few short passages that are set in the villa, this story takes place entirely outside at the seashore. More than acting as a mere backdrop for human action, though, the natural world has an integral relationship to Jerry’s psychological development within the narrative. The ocean, as Lessing describes it, is both beautiful and unforgiving, a site for tranquility and for risk-taking adventure. Lessing’s language lyrically captures both the scenery of the…
read analysis of Nature
