Rainy River and Honia River: Compare and Contrast

“On the Rainy River” and “The Return” are similar in the fact that they are stories about life and yet both short stories are quite different from each other. Both have very unique settings, characters, and story lines. While “On the Rainy River” is about Tim O’Brien running away from his life, “The Return” is about a man named Kamau coming back to his life. There is one thing, however, that both stories have in common. Each story is based largely around rivers. “On the Rainy River” is set in Minnesota while “The Return” is about the Honia River in Kenya.
Both rivers represent important concepts relative to their stories. Many of these concepts are quite similar between both stories. One of these similarities is what each river represents to the main characters. In “On the Rainy River,” Tim sees the river and is reminded of his simple past as a child. He proclaims that he sees “Chunks of his own history flashing by” (Page 82). These flashbacks cause O’Brien to realize that his life would slip away if he ran to Canada. In “The Return,” Kamau also sees his past in the Honia River. The River is where he grew up and is the last part of his life left unchanged before he went to a prison camp. “Perhaps the river would not recognize in his hardened features that same boy to whom the riverside world had meant everything.” said Kamau in a moment of reflection (page 45). The difference is that while Tim is forced to make a quick decision on whether to give up his old life and start anew or go back and join the military, Kamau does not have a choice and is forced to give up his old life. Tim eventually decides that it would be better to keep his old life and go to war than restart in Canada. His choice is swayed greatly by the fact that he is afraid of the embarrassment of not doing what everyone else thinks is right: “I would go to war-I would kill and maybe die-because I was embarrassed not to” (page 83). In Contrast, Kamau loses the last of his personal affects in the river and moves on to try and forge his new life. Again, Kamau and O’Briens emotions are in contrast. Where Kamau “felt relieved” and ready to start his new life, Tim breaks down at the thought of losing everything he has worked so hard for (page 49). Tim’s fear is represented through the image of “a big crow looking at him from a boulder along the river” (page 81). The crow, being a symbol for death, signifies that Tim feels his life end if he moved to Canada. Kamaus loss of personal belongings also represents his life ending. Kamau is relieved, however, because he no longer has to carry his past with him like he had for five years when he lived in the prison camp. One of the most important symbols that the river lends to each of these stories is its swift current. The current of the Rainy River shows the urgency with which Tim must make his decision. Although this is not the case for the Honia River, the currents of both rivers still share one meaning. They both show how life keeps going. If we spend time making a decision or are stuck in the past, life around us will continue to press forward like the flow of a river.
While both rivers do not necessarily depict the same meanings, they are similar in many ways. The rivers remind each character of their own history and allow them to see what they are, or might be, giving up. Both rivers are also the setting for the main characters when they make their final realizations about their past and future lives. Both the Honia and Rainy River make the perfect setting because of their symbolic value. They represent the urgency of choices and unerring continuation of life.While acknowledging many differences between “On the Rainy River” and “The Return”, it can be suggested that there are more similarities between the two then contrasting factors.