Tinkers

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2009

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Symbols & Motifs

Clocks

In Tinkers, clocks are everywhere. George fixes clocks and fills his house and workshop with clocks in various stages of disrepair. These clocks are a symbol for Death, Mortality, and the Passage of Time, and they also represent the circular nature of life and the ways in which memories can be kept alive. An excerpt from The Reasonable Horologist states that the purpose of a clock “is to return the hands back to that time, a time which, from the moment chosen, the hands leave and skate across the rest of the clock’s painted signs” (189). In this way, a clock represents life as a person’s journey from birth to death, or from unbeing to unbeing. They experience life as they travel back to their starting point.

George associates clocks with his own mortality, believing that their winding down reflects his own; when they stop ticking, he panics, believing that his own heart will stop ticking. Essentially, the clocks represent the passage of time and the inevitability of death. However, they have the ability to be rewound and instilled with new life, and in this way, they represent The Power of Memory to bring back past moments. After George’s death, his wife tinkers with clocks, “fuss[ing] and fine-tun[ing] for months, to [make them] strike a chord that nearly conjure[s] her dead husband, almost invoke[s] him in the room” (44). By winding the clocks, George’s wife seems to be rewinding time itself as she stirs up memories of him. The clocks represent the inevitable march of time, which when combined with mortality, signify the inevitability of death as the natural end to life. Still, clocks can be rewound and given new life, just as people can live on through the memories of others.

The Book

While George lays on his deathbed, he believes his grandson, Charlie, reads to him from a book that Charlie found in the attic. The book has a red cover and is handwritten, and it contains encyclopedia-like entries about life in the north. It is unclear whose book this is, and its very existence is doubtful since George’s wife later states that there is no such book. However, the book’s entries pop up throughout the novel and seem to be written by Howard. In this sense, the book is a motif for the passing on of knowledge and experience from generation to generation. Howard writes of his life living in the north, and now, generations later, George is revisiting it while his grandson reads it for the first time. As Charlie introduces the book to George, he recognizes the unique aspects of the book. He tells George, “It looks like you wrote the book. It is a dictionary or an encyclopedia of some sort. The book is full of reports from the backs of events, full of weak, cold light from the north, small constructions from short summers” (55). The entries in the book introduce life in Maine, where the harsh, severe weather makes life difficult for people. The long winters and short summers, combined with storms and nature, have a terrible beauty. Charlie is introduced to the lives led by past generations of his family, which is wholly unfamiliar to him. For George, they act as a remembrance of his childhood and a connection to his father. The book and its contents act as a bridge between different generations and the experiences that shaped their family.

Seizures

Howard’s seizures play an important role in his life. They complicate his relationship with his family and are the reason behind Howard’s flight. The seizures operate in the novel as a motif for chaos: They are unpredictable and severe, as when Howard bites George; also, when Howard experiences seizures, he associates the feeling with electricity and “tast[ing] the raw stuff” of “the star-gushing universe” (57). In the midst of a seizure, Howard feels a strong surge of energy course through him; this takes over his body and he is powerless against it. When he has a seizure, the usual separation between him and the energy of the universe evaporates; the order of the world is undone, and he cannot stop it. Just as Howard’s seizures strike without warning, life, too, can change quickly and drastically. The events of Tinkers show how this plays out in the lives of its characters, and Howard’s seizures symbolize the unpredictability of the human condition.