“Everyone knows it wasn’t like that” (Findley 3) is the first sentence of Not Wanted on the Voyage by Timothy Findley. This book is a re-telling of the biblical story of the flood that everyone thinks they know and understand. Timothy Findley is a Canadian author from Toronto. Findley’s writing style shows themes of sexuality, gender, and mental illness. He died June 21, 2002 at age 71. Not Wanted on the Voyage follows the Noyes family on their voyage when the flood destroyed the world. There are symbolic characters that can be related to. Also, symbols with important meanings. Many themes are examined that can be applied to real life. Not Wanted on the Voyage allows students to make connections to past and present society which makes it a book that should be part of the curriculum.
Every character in this novel can be symbolic. For instance, Mrs Noyes. Mrs Noyes performs multiple rebellious acts when she thinks something is…show more content… Feminism is one theme in this novel. All the girls in this novel are constantly being treated unfairly and being made feel worthless by the boys, excluding Ham. The most evident act of feminism is when Mrs Noyes runs away from the ark. According to Yaweh’s edict, she must be on the ark or the voyage will not be successful. Noah admits that Mrs Noyes actually has power when he says “She will kill us all!” (125). Mrs Noyes shows she has power and right too. “It seems that for Findley’s female warriors, there is only one way to gain a positive sense of themselves as female, and that is by fighting male privilege on it’s own ground” (Demousselle 51). The girls in this book have to fight to show they are humans too. Emma shows even she has power by fighting Japeth, Mrs Noyes tries to interfere with Japeth for trying to kill the dolphins and Lucy puts a curse on him. Feminism is one of the biggest things in history and even today so connections can be made from this novel to
