48 pages • 1-hour read
Our Infinite Fates
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Sewing Machine
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of child death and child abuse.
Evelyn often thinks about her preferred future: what she’d like to do if she survives her 18th birthday. In her incarnation as Branwen Blythe, she recognizes that she’s “always had an unhealthy attachment to objects. They felt like touchstones of the lives [she] loved, and yet [she] could never take them with [her]” (246-47). These objects become symbolic of her lives—of who she is and of whom and what she loves in each one. As Branwen, she grows especially attached to an old Singer sewing machine that she keeps at the back of her closet. It symbolizes her dreams of owning a vintage clothing store, traveling the world to hunt for interesting pieces, developing her own fashion line, or simply becoming a seamstress who mends her clients’ “beloved garments.”
In short, the sewing machine symbolizes Evelyn’s future—one that she knows she’ll likely never enjoy unless something significant changes in her life. While sitting in her bedroom one day, she says that she leaves “the wardrobe ajar, as though that would keep the doors to [her] dreams propped open too” (247). On the one hand, looking at the machine makes her sad because she knows that she will likely never achieve the future it represents; on the other hand, it represents the dreams and potential that give her happiness. In this, it is a bittersweet symbol that reminds her of her aspirations as well as her limitations.
Ultimately, Evelyn is able to fulfill her dreams—though not as Evelyn. Rather, the sewing machine foreshadows Evelyn’s incarnation as Léon Cazares, a clothing designer. That she remains interested in clothes and fashion across lifetimes evokes the relative stability of other aspects of her experience, including her capacity for hope and her deep love for those close to her, including Arden and Gracie.
The Color Red
The color red is a motif that first appears in the Prologue, and its constant reappearance throughout the text highlights The Power of Love to Shape Human Events. At the wedding in which the bride (Arden) cuts the groom’s (Evelyn’s) throat, the last thing that either one sees is “the red ribbon of fate still binding their wrists” (4). In the context of the ceremony, however, this red ribbon is symbolic of their love—not fate. In fact, the text demonstrates that love, not fate, destiny, or even a god, is responsible for human experience. Thus, throughout the text, red symbolizes love. For example, in Northern Song, the lifetime to which Arden dates his love for Evelyn, she notes the “bloodred” Xuande Gate and even wears red court robes when she goes to the prison and takes a beating to spare Arden’s father.
This is why it is Evelyn’s favorite color, though she herself doesn’t realize this connection. In Wales, she says that red is her “favourite colour, though [she’d] long ago forgotten why” (93). For all her hardships, Evelyn remains a romantic, and the color symbolizes her undying hope that, one day, the love she and Arden share will surmount the obstacles that always thwart it. In Nauru, Evelyn’s “ridiculous optimist’s heart” is similarly associated with the color (49). As she slots her fingers into Arden’s, she gets a flash of an image in her head: “raw as a wound and deep as a well: our hands fastened together with a ribbon of red” (49). This image stays with her because of its deep significance and the color connected with it.
Nor is the motif limited to romantic love. In her final incarnation as a clothing designer, Evelyn creates a dress worn by Gracie Blythe. Though the Met Gala’s theme that year is “Troubled Sea,” leading most attendees to wear greens and blues, Léon Cazares creates an unexpected “scarlet silk gown” for Gracie (335). This color is emblematic of Evelyn’s love for her one-time sister, which transcends lifetimes, just as her love for Arden does.
Evelyn’s List
As Branwen, Evelyn keeps a list of all the things she’d like to do when she reaches adulthood. Gracie finds it and calls it “extremely tragic […] as though adulthood is some mythical state” (17), not knowing that, for her sister, adulthood might as well as a myth because she never gets to experience it. Reflecting on this, Evelyn says, “I’d kept such a list in every life I could remember, filled with things I’d do once I broke the curse and finally lived. Because if you can imagine a future, then surely, surely, it must be real, must be possible” (17). The list therefore symbolizes Evelyn’s seemingly unlimited capacity for hope, functioning as a form of indirect characterization. Despite the fact that Evelyn never survives to adulthood—and thus never gets to accomplish or complete any of the items on her list—she makes such a list in every lifetime, never losing faith that one day, things will change for the better.
Unlock the meaning behind every key symbol & motif
See how recurring imagery, objects, and ideas shape the narrative.
- Explore how the author builds meaning through symbolism
- Understand what symbols & motifs represent in the text
- Connect recurring ideas to themes, characters, and events