Swallow Me Whole Weekly Round Up

So, as we all know, we only had one class period to discuss this really dense book.  While we got a fair amount of stuff covered in class, we also have a lot of material that we didn’t get a chance to discuss.

For one, we never got as in depth with the subject of the Schizophrenia as I would have liked.  The Wizard, the Cicadas, and the little Pill-Monster were obviously embodiments of each characters mental illness, but it would be interesting to find out if there was any sort of significance to them.  We discussed how the little Pill-Monster might have been the Grandmother’s disease triggering Ruth’s illness, or possibly representative of the ineffective medications that they were taking.  The Wizard and the Cicadas never really came up though, so it will be interesting if anyone has anything to say about them next Tuesday.

The other big thing that we didn’t really get to was the end of the book.  The ending was very confusing as to what was actually happening.  I doubt that Ruth was actually buried by a swarm of Cicadas, and personally think it was representative of her disease overtaking her.  But it gets really weird after that section because it appears that she actually has died as evidenced by Peri and her boyfriend digging through piles of dead bugs and her parents seemingly identifying a body based on a picture.  Peri then seems to slip into Ruth’s world, and ends up in the same realm with Ruth and the Grandmother.  This could be taken as his succumbing to his disease, or possibly dying, or some other equally valid interpretation.  In any event, that was a pretty awesome way to end the book… even if it was really weird.

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