72 pages • 2 hours read
Alix E. HarrowThe Ten Thousand Doors of January
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2019A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Symbols & Motifs
Books
Harrow uses books as a motif throughout the novel to further the theme that words have power. Furthermore, she highlights books as symbolic Doors into new and exciting worlds, like the physical Doors January opens. Just like her father Yule, January loves reading, and uses it as an escape from her mundane life with Locke. She develops a friendship with Samuel over their mutual love for stories, and they secretly pass books to each other as children. Even though January has a sheltered and uneventful childhood, reading fuels her adventurous spirit.
Harrow mentions by name several books that January reads, such as The Jungle Book and Anne of Green Gables. The use of book titles creates a connection with readers who have read and loved the particular books mentioned. It also creates the impression that Harrow’s novel is a true story. Harrow further highlights books by writing a book within her novel: The Ten Thousand Doors. She even includes chapter titles and footnotes, which give it the characteristics of a published work. This particular book, written by January’s father Yule, helps January discover her identity. It offers her an escape from the endless hours in Battleboro, helps her keep her sanity, and gives her bravery to escape and look for her father. Finally, at the end of the novel, January reveals that she is writing her story as a book for Samuel, in hopes that he will remember her. Harrow’s many uses of books show the importance of books and stories as vessels of escape, identity, learning, and friendship. She uses books to highlight the immense power of words to shape one’s life and the world.
The Silver Coin
Harrow uses the silver coin as a symbol of January’s rightful identity as a brave young woman with parents and friends who love her. Her relationship to the coin changes along with her belief in Doors. For example, when Locke suppresses her wild and adventurous personality as a young girl, January eventually stops carrying the coin around and places the coin in her jewelry box, symbolizing her submission to being a good girl to please Locke. Later, when Locke locks January in her room, she retrieves the coin and remembers the day in the hayfield when she was seven. The coin gives her the courage and faith she needs to write her locked door open. As she continues to read The Ten Thousand Doors, she discovers that the coin was a gift to Ade from Yule, and the coin serves as confirmation that the story is true—Doors are real. January also uses the coin as a pen to write on her own skin to escape Battleboro, and to write on the Door to lock Ilvane away forever. The coin even serves as a knife when January defends herself against Ilvane. As January takes steps away from Locke and towards her true self, the coin acts as confirmation of her identity, a tool with which to realize her power as a word-worker, and a weapon to defeat her enemies. Harrow’s use of the coin points to January’s transformation from a submissive, powerless girl to an assertive, brave young woman with the power to open closed Doors.
Sensory Imagery: Smells
Harrow describes smells throughout the novel to show how January perceives her surroundings, as well as to characterize the various worlds January encounters. For example, during January’s imprisonment at Battleboro, she smells, “starch and ammonia and lye, and something else that might have been panic” (126). This description places the reader alongside January in her antiseptic prison; this is the smell of her captivity. When she escapes to Samuel’s cabin, the smell there completely contrasts with Battleboro: “pine needles and cool earth and warm July lake water” (185). These fresh smells represent her freedom. Harrow’s use of sensory imagery through smells places the reader alongside January and associates particular moods and meanings with certain places.
Significant objects and other worlds also have particular smells. For instance, the silver coin smells of “nutmeg and sandalwood” (31), a description that hints the coin is not from earth, but has an otherworldly history. January’s mother’s boat, The Key, smells like her father’s book, The Ten Thousand Doors, showing her parents’ interconnected relationship despite their years apart. Furthermore, worlds have particular smells, such as the Written’s scent of “salt and warm stone” (10). Through her descriptions of smells, Harrow shows which world she discusses, rather than simply telling the reader. She shows the relationships between people, worlds, and objects, and puts the reader in January’s shoes as her senses experience the exotic atmospheres of new worlds.
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By Alix E. Harrow
