The Thorn Bird Symbol Analysis

The thorn bird symbolizes the cost of striving for something sacred or unreachable, especially for Ralph, whose rise in the Church demands that he give up love. The Celtic myth of the thorn bird tells of a creature that sings its most beautiful song only once, at the moment of death, after impaling itself on a thorn. Ralph follows a similar path. He becomes a Cardinal—a title that also happens to be the name of a bird—by choosing the Church over Meggie again and again. His success requires sacrifice, and each step up the Church’s hierarchy takes him further from the life he might have had with her. By the time he realizes he has fathered a son, Dane, it is too late: it is only Dane dies tragically in a drowning accident when Meggie confesses to Ralph that Dane is his son. He dies not as a powerful  and fulfilled figure, but as a man broken by what he gave up. But the thorn bird does not symbolize Ralph alone. Meggie sacrifices her happiness to raise Dane, Fiona carries a lifetime of grief for Frank, and Justine feels (however unfairly) that she has lost brother because she chose ambition over family. Thus, the myth of the thorn bird speaks to all the book’s characters who struggle with feelings of grief and regret. The pain is different, but the pattern is the same—great love, followed by great loss.