45 pages • 1-hour read
Marilynne RobinsonLila
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Symbols & Motifs
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of pregnancy termination, graphic violence, and death.
Gilead
Gilead is the novel’s primary setting and symbolizes community and belonging. When Lila Dahl first starts spending time in the town, she is uncertain why she feels drawn to the place. She is living in the cabin outside of town but spends her time moseying into Gilead, studying the townspeople’s gardens, standing outside the church, and even at times picking up work. The town has an innate draw, which Lila does not initially understand: “Why was she always walking into Gilead? […] And when she asked herself that question and answered it—No good reason—she felt as though she had put a burden down” (46). Lila’s inexplicable connection to the place is a manifestation of her desire for acceptance. She longs for a sense of home and family and unconsciously understands that she might find it in Gilead.
Lila has a fraught relationship with the town during her early days there, because she is still learning how to be a part of a community. “Walking into Gilead, she felt just the way she had felt in those days” (47) she was with Doll, Doane, Marcelle, Arthur, and Mellie, “except now she was alone” (47). The town offers her the possibility of connection, which she has lost since separating from her companions. She initially feels uncomfortable in Gilead, however, because she fears the townspeople will judge, disparage, and reject her. Over time, the Reverend John Ames helps her to settle down in Gilead and to find her place there. He is the only person Lila has ever met who seems to accept her no matter what he knows about her past; his grace inspires the townspeople’s grace and ushers Lila into a new communal center.
Shawl
The shawl Doll took from the cabin when she took Lila as an infant is a symbol of maternity, biology, and origins. Lila and Doll carry the shawl with them wherever they go. It provides warmth and comfort, while offering Lila a connection point to her past. When Doane later burns the shawl to get back at Doll, Lila is devastated. The shawl was the only thing she had from her infancy and birth. Without it, she loses this sole channel to her biological history.
Knife
The knife Lila carries with her is a symbol of guilt and shame. The knife once belonged to Doll. Doll used the knife to kill Lila’s father when he came after Doll, seeking revenge. Doll then gives the knife to Lila for safekeeping. Lila is attached to the knife because it is the only gift Doll gave her and the only connection she has to her lost loved one. However, she is also attached to it because it reifies her often unnameable, plaguing emotions. Lila lives with a constant sense of shame over her past life, even those aspects of it which she’s not responsible for. She feels ashamed of her birth circumstances and biological family although she had no control of them. She feels ashamed over Doll’s decision to commit murder, but she had no part in it. She later feels ashamed for terminating a pregnancy she never had. The knife—often depicted covered in blood—is a manifestation of this intangible and often illogical shame.
Lila’s fraught relationship with the knife conveys her fraught emotional state throughout the novel. At times, she panics when she does not have the knife on her person. At other times, she panics when the knife is within reach. She temporarily decides to get rid of the knife when she is in labor, but ends up holding on to it by the end of the novel. She does not get rid of the knife because, she decides, “There was no way to abandon guilt, no decent way to disown it. All the tangles and knots of bitterness and desperation and fear had to be pitied” (260). By keeping the knife, Lila is allowing space for her shame and guilt to exist, without letting them define her.
Sweater
The preacher’s sweater is a symbol of intimacy. Lila’s decision to take and hold onto the sweater conveys her desire for connection. When she is in the cabin alone, she hugs the sweater or holds it to her face. She even talks to the sweater as if it were the preacher himself because Lila is alienated, alone, and desperate for love.
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