The Feather

Hope you're not allergic, because feathers all over this book. Despite floating across the pages, though, and showing up in several different contexts, in each situation feathers invariably stand for hope.

The first time we see a feather, Cam has hallucinated Dulcie's presence in his house. Just when he thinks he's lost his mind, he glimpses the only physical evidence that she may have really been there:

Something catches my eye. The window's open. That's new. And there on the windowsill is a feather. I pick it up. It's huge. Bigger and thicker than any bird's feather I've ever seen. Soft and white with pink at the edges. Huh. I turn it over in my hand and I swear, I must be going mental, because there on the snowy surface of that gigantic feather is one word, a greeting. Hello. (5.19)

Dulcie likes to leave feathers behind for Cam, like some kind of angelic graffiti proclaiming Dulcie wuz here. In many cases it is her way of saying that he's not alone, that he has her to count on through the difficult times.

The feather is also literally a symbol that Cameron learns to follow as part of his mission. He's a bit thick, so it takes awhile, but eventually he catches on:

A large, peeling billboard advertising the Roadrunner bus depot. The smiling roadrunner is in a full run, going so fast that one of his feathers flies loose behind him. JUST FOLLOW THE FEATHER TO BIFROST ROAD, the sign says. Follow the feather. It's not trumpets or thunderclaps, but it's the best we've got right now. (17.29)

In fact, at this point in the story Cam has encountered the instructions to "follow the feather" a few different times already—but the significance had escaped his notice. When he starts doing some Internet sleuthing about the strange things that have been happening to him (good luck Googling "fire giants"), he follows the feather to the video with Dr. X:

I hit Refresh, and suddenly, a new link pops up: www.followthefeather.com. And there's a picture of one of those weird feathers like I found in my room. My mouth is so dry it's like my saliva's been burgled. Finally, I tap the bar, and the screen goes dark for a second. An image of the It's a Small World ride comes up. The song bleeds from my speakers. A line of script floats to the middle of my screen and settles into focus: Follow the feather. Beside it is a little feather icon. I click on it, and a video clip plays. (10.49)

This is the video in which Dr. X starts monologuing about the Emily Dickinson quote:

The Copenhagen Interpretation song still plays. He holds up a big, pinkish-white feather. "'Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul.' Emily Dickinson. Why must we die when everything within us yearns to live? Do our atoms not dream of more?" His hand closes around something that looks like a ticket or key card. "Tonight, I embark for other worlds. Searching for proof. For hope. For a reason to go on. Or a reason to end…" (10.56)

Feathers, feathers, and more feathers. They're everywhere Cameron looks. But more importantly, this is where we can start gleaming a deeper meaning from them. If "hope is the thing with feathers," doesn't that make Dulcie the personification of hope? She has tons of feathers, after all, and her presence offers reassurance that things will be okay—she offers hope for Cameron's tentative future.

When you start to think about Dulcie as the physical representation of hope, everything starts to come together. When Cam is walking along the beach daydreaming about his lovemaking he describes an intangible quality that Dulcie's feathers seem to have:

Using the driftwood as a walking stick, I hike along the shore, thinking about Dulcie, about the way her wings felt, smooth and soft except for the spines in each feather. Nestled into all that velvety down was something solid but supple, something hard to break, hundreds of them fanning out around me like the softest, most improbable shell. It makes me smile to know she's in the world. That's all. (46.29)

Hmm. Something solid but supple, something hard to break, surrounding him in a cocoon of good feelings… what could that be? Hope, maybe? And then things start to get a bit surreal. Just as Cam's overcome by these warm and fuzzy feelings, a shower of feathers besieges him:

A feather drops onto my head, followed by another, and another. Feathers fall like snow from the sky. A great big pillow fight of feathers coating my skin, the beach, the water, till all I can do is twirl and laugh in them, a character in my own broken snow globe. (46.30)

It's no coincidence that the apex of Cameron's happiness coincides with him being surrounded by a cyclone of symbolic hope. He might be about to die, but he finally feels oh so good about living.