66 pages • 2-hour read
Insomnia
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Symbols & Motifs
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death.
Deathwatch
The deathwatch is a recurring motif for Overcoming the Fear of Uncertainty. It represents Ralph’s fearful anticipation of death, which he first experiences when Carolyn is dying: “[H]e listened to […] the deathwatch ticking inside Carolyn, and it seemed to him that his heart would break with sorrow and terror. How much would she be required to suffer before the end came? How much would he be required to suffer?” (5)
The desire to escape these questions compels Ralph to go on his long walks, which brings him to Ed at the airport. The deathwatch not only suggests death’s inevitability, but its inescapability. Despite Ralph’s best attempts to get away from the deathwatch, his encounter with Ed eventually leads to his involvement in the conflict between the Random and the Purpose, immersing him in a hyper-awareness of death. Consequently, the deathwatch recurs at the end of the novel, after Ralph has resolved the main conflict of the narrative. Ralph anticipates the death of Natalie, which he plans to substitute with his own.
Ralph’s second experience with the deathwatch sees a change in attitude, as Ralph no longer tries to walk away from death, but toward it. By then he has overcome his fear of the questions that surround death, making him believe that he is buying time for Natalie to live a fulfilling life. His final words mark the stop of the deathwatch, which he smiles to, signaling that he is satisfied with the end.
Tokens
Tokens are the novel’s symbol of human individuality. Ralph identifies them as the personal objects Atropos steals to assert his power over people. He first recognizes this pattern when he sees that Atropos has stolen Bill McGovern’s Panama hat. Later, Atropos steals Rosalie’s bandana and Lois Chasse’s diamond earrings, wearing them in mockery of the people whose lives he plans to take for the Random.
In Part 3, Chapter 25, Ralph and Lois uncover a massive chamber in Atropos’s lair, which contains all of the tokens he’s stolen from people over the decades. The chamber’s gargantuan scale suggests the ubiquity of senseless death, which Ralph alludes to with references to the mass casualties of natural disasters, calamities, crime, and war. Within this chamber, Ralph and Lois also find a smaller chamber that contains the tokens of all the people whose lives Atropos plans to claim at the Susan Day rally. In the center is Ed’s wedding ring, foreshadowing the role he will play in enacting those deaths. As long as Atropos possesses Ed’s wedding ring, he also holds power over the fates of Ed’s family. Ralph steals the ring, as well as Lois’s earrings, to strip Atropos of that power.
Derry of Auras
The Derry of Auras is a prominent symbol in the novel that represents social invisibility. It first appears in Part 1, Chapter 5 after Joe Wyzer explains hyper-reality to Ralph. Ralph fades in and out of his perception of the auras as he steadily acclimates to the higher planes of existence.
The auras point to a world that generally goes unseen by the rest of humanity. People do not normally have the capacity to perceive auras, but this does not rule out their existence. This symbolically resonates with the way Ralph and Lois are sometimes perceived by their peers and the younger generations of Derry. In Part 2, Chapter 15, Lois remarks that loneliness is the worst part of her life as an elderly woman: “No one talks to you anymore—oh, they talk at you, sometimes, but that’s not the same—and mostly it’s like people don’t even see you. Have you ever felt that way?” (415). King similarly depicts other sectors of Derry that go unseen or ignored by everyday society, from the man who asks Ralph for change to the abusive family situation at the Deepneau household.
As Ralph becomes aware of the Derry of Auras, he also becomes aware of the parts of his hometown that he never realized were there because he failed to look closely. This plays into the arc of his character growth, which requires him to slow down and appreciate the finer details of life to overcome his fear of uncertain and unknowable things, like death.
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