5. How do you intepret the end of the novel? Do you see it as redemptive or destructive? (By 'end of the novel' I mean the last sentence - the sinking into the mud and the star in the sky.)
"When he turned to look up for the last time at Ephraim, all he saw was a six-pointed star turning slowly against the black sky" (370). I thought this was a terrible way to end the story. I hate when books don't have a nice, finished ending, because I would really like to know the last little bit that happened. I'm assuming that they sank into the mud and died, but I would have liked knowing for certain.
Aside from my own disappointment with the ending, I didn't really think the ending was in one way redemptive or destructive. However, I am leaning more toward redemptive. In the story of St. Christopher, the saint was 'redeemed' for carrying the Christ-child. "'You have had not only the whole world on your back but also him who created the world. For I am Christ your king, whom you have rendered this service'" (41). He is rewarded with a fruitful tree for carrying the child to safety. Tiffauges is also redeemed for his sins in the end of the story, by carrying the child to safety. However, I think Tiffauges was more redeemed when he rescued the boy and sheltered him. I thought that relationship was very different than the others Tiffauges has had with children. Tiffauges assumed the role of a paternal figure, and made sure the boy was safe instead of exploiting him in some way. I had a completely different view of Tiffauges once Ephraim entered the story. I pitied Tiffauges in the beginning, because he seemed so pathetic. Then, as the story progressed, he disgusted me. And then, at the end, I regarded him a little more highly for rescuing the child and protecting him to the very end.
I read the ending of the story as though Tiffauges was the peat bog man and Ephraim was the child-head they found. We have discussed how children are the Alpha, and it would make sense that since they only found the head of the second person that it would be a child and an Alpha. I liked how the peat bog man came back again, and I thought it was a greater symbol here. I mean, I understand how it could symbolize the missing Jews, but I think it fits better as a pre-symbol for Tiffauges' fate.
the ending
I thought the last 20 pages of the novel were absolutely excellent. The novel itself was really good, but the ending was both expected and totally unexpected. When Tournier (through Ephraim) explained all the symbols finally, and seeing Tiffauges react to them, it was like I was seeing for the first time all the different connections. I mean obviously I as the removed observer was aware of all the symbols, but when he explained everything I got all excited like "Yes! I knew that's what that meant!" and so on.
I thought Tiffauges' reaction to the hair was really striking. "Tiffauges could not hear this without seeing himself holding a sack of hair in one hand and offering Frau Dorn a haunch of venison with the other. He remembered how the tall clumsy creature backed away, making negative gestures with her head, her hands, her whole body. She must have heard about the hair at Auschwitz and thought she was being asked to take part in that vast and macabre manufacture" (355).
He finally sees himself as the Nazi had really become. Yes, he was still French and still a prisoner, but he adopted the German language, and integrated himself so well with his captors that he essentially became one of them. "Thus, through Ephraim's long confessions, Tiffauges, steeped in horror, saw an infernal city remorselessly building up which corresponded stone by stone to the phoric city he himself had dreamed of at Kaltenborn...all his inventions, all his discoveries were reflected in the horrible mirror, inverted and raised to hellish incandescence" (357).
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