Author Archives: katrinakeay

I believe the most common theme of Transatlantic by Colum McCann is suffrage.  With each part of the novel, the main characters suffer in one way or another.  With each part, the main character is dealt pain and suffering, and in turn overcomes this problem.  By doing this, McCann creates a climax and resolution within each character.  For example, in book three, Hannah is still morning the loss of her son, Tomas, while dealing with the possibility of losing her family’s cottage.  The cottage is the place of Tomas’s death and holds many other family memories.  She tries to sell the letter written by her great-grandmother, Emily Ehrlich, taken across the Atlantic in the first airmail flight. Because the letter remand unopened, it was not worth the money she needed.  At one point Hannah thinks of suicide, “A friend of mine once wisely said that suicide only suits the young.  I counseled myself to stop sulking and simply enjoy my time there” (McCann 292).  The letter is later open and read to Hannah by the same man who choices to by her cottage.

Another example of suffrage is the story of Lily Duggan.  She also suffers the loss of her son, Tomas, McCann describes “He was near the top of the pile, but his face was obscured.  She had no need to turn him over.  She knew straightaway” (McCann 167).  After she finds her son’s body she chooses to begin a new life with Jon Ehrlich.  They build a family and work to farm ice.  An accident happens and she losses her husband and her two oldest sons.  After many years of harvesting ice, she managed to build her business and send her remaining boys to college.