Themes from Beka Lamb

Zee Edgell presents a number of themes. These are Maturity/Change, Success diminishes grief and pain and Fear of failure. She spoke of ‘Maturity/Change’. The maturity is seen through Beka where she mature from a typical ‘flat-rate Belize Creole’ into a person of ‘high mind’. Beka had a habit of lying in order to get out of trouble. Her father usually called her ‘phoney’ which meant that she was of pretentious airs. She was ‘All flash but no substance’ as Beka’s father said also comparing her to the bougainvillea that grew wild. Beka lied about passing her exams after being found out by her parents. Her parents detested most of her lying. At this point she taught it was the time to change; to show her parents that she can be different and will do better in her future exams only if she’s allowed to return to school. Beka showed this first by telling her parents the truth about her exams then she cleaned the attic with ‘feverish energy’ instead of skipping an inch of the floor. The writer tells us that sometimes we have to make changes in our lives to get what we want in Beka’s case she wants another chance at going back to school.
‘Success diminishes grief and pain’ is another theme the ‘death’ of Toycie was horrific and brought a lot of pain to Beka. Beka soon was able to release all the tensions of her pass due to her winning the essay contest which was known to only be won by the bakras, panias and expatriates and she also passed her end-of -term exam. The ‘glimpses of sun shafts’, ‘the glint of the sea’ and ‘a slight brown-skinned figure with crinkly hair made a bird’s nest by the wind , running’ gave the feeling of Beka’s freedom, the light coming out of all her darkness; the grief . She soon finds comfort in the memories.
‘Fear of failure’ is depicted through the dream Beka had. Through the dream Zee Edgell gives us a closer look into what is going on in Beka’s life. Beka dreams of a bridge, which symbolized her transformation ; Beka moving from one point of her life to another. Under the bridge, there’s ‘filth floating’ and ‘excrement’ this represents failure. If she only falls in it she fails and if she doesn’t try she also fails. The people around her shouted, ‘Jump, nigger gial, jump!’ these people were the ones who pushed her to try; to take the risk. She then wakes up with ‘her chest like a pestle pounding plaintains’ showing she was afraid and also relieved that it was just a dream.