The River

In this last section, the novel reaches its climax, followed by a brief denouement. Before the sudden increase in action, the narrative conveys a lull: “There’s a certain stillness before dawn. A caesura. The fire was a heap of dusted embers. No wind. In the lacuna between outbreath and inbreath even the owl hushed” (222-23). The hush and the quiet give the appearance of calm, but the reality is that it’s merely a respite from more calamity.

When the Texans, Brent and JD, return to the narrative, they appear grateful for the warning that Jack and Wynn previously gave them about the fire. They’re also generous, offering food and relief to Jack, Wynn, and Maia. However, Jack is still suspicious of them. His first impression of them early in the novel still holds, and—emphasizing the themes of Survival and Human Versus Natural Threats—Jack doesn’t think that presuming the goodness of others is a wise wilderness-survival strategy. Before dozing off, Jack sits up with JD as the latter drinks heavily. He watches JD closely and sees that the man keeps peering at Maia in the tent: “Jack had the strong impression that it wasn’t just because he had burning questions. There was a young woman lying in there, however injured. That’s the sense Jack got” (222). As it turns out, Jack’s gut instinct accurately predicts the circumstances that follow. Hearing Maia cry out, Jack immediately awakens and springs into action. He doesn’t attempt to question JD, even as JD pleads that he was doing nothing wrong and that Jack misunderstood the situation. Jack temporarily incapacitates JD and hustles to steal the Texans’ canoe.

When Wynn awakens, he struggles to understand what’s happening, and when he discerns that Jack is stealing the canoe, he objects: “Hey, hey, Jack…Why’re you taking their boat?” (225). Wynn’s instinct is to follow his values, not his gut, and stealing the canoe is ethically wrong. When he breaks the silence, which allows Brent to wake up and take defensive measures, he essentially makes himself a target, and Brent shoots him. Brent isn’t shooting at the canoe out of homicidal impulse; instead, his survival instincts kick in: He realizes that the theft of the canoe is tantamount to an attempted assault or even murder. After Jack escapes from Brent’s retaliation, he instinctively understands why the man fired at Wynn—that the theft of a canoe in such remote wilderness warranted lethal retaliation. Jack recognizes that Brent was likely “a decent man who had just shot a decent kid. Because Jack had stolen their boat” (227). Brent shoots because his boat is crucial to his own survival, illustrating that in the wilderness, the rules are different: The phrase “just cause” takes on a different meaning.

In the epilogue, Jack visits Wynn’s mother, Hansie, and sister, Jess. For much of the novel, Jack has performed under pressure and conquered his fears, which enabled him to survive. Therefore, Jack’s questioning himself—he “wondered for the first time in his life if he was a coward” (241)—before meeting with Hansie provides insight into his psyche. Having to confront a grieving mother is an entirely different kind of challenge than all that transpired during the wilderness excursion. In this case, the main difference is time. In the wild, Jack usually acted decisively, guided by his instincts. When he meets Hansie, he has had time to reflect and imagine what kind of reaction she might have. Dwelling on this unknown element likely escalates his apprehension. However, Hansie and Jess’s open encouragement to Jack to share the details about everything that happened helps Jack fully realize that they don’t blame him for Wynn’s death and that they understand that Jack is grieving too.

As the novel concludes, the narrative expresses a statement on the transcendency of art. As Jack recounts to Hansie and Jess the events that befell him and Wynn, he omits (but reflects on) the moment when he stopped at the beach and tried to send Wynn’s canoe figurine into Hudson Bay. Each time he tried to send it off, the canoe returned to him. After a while, “he picked up the canoe and held it in his hand and walked back into town” (254). Presumably, Jack (who ponders the significance of natural phenomena and objects as signs throughout the novel) realizes on some level that because the figurine kept returning to him—and because he’s connected to the spirit of its creator—he’s meant to keep it as a memento of his friend Wynn.