Death of the Roe Deer

The death of the roe deer symbolizes Winifred’s distorted worldview and the novel’s broader critique of cruelty. By bludgeoning the animal in front of Andrew and Drusilla, Winifred asserts a philosophy in which all living beings are inherently suffering. Thus, she justifies her violent intervention by framing it is as a “mercy.” The scene foregrounds her instability while also highlighting the failure of adults to recognize danger in their midst. Simultaneously, it mirrors socially sanctioned cruelty because the upper-class characters consume animals prepared with extreme and deliberate suffering. This shows that institutionalized violence is normalized, whereas Winifred’s acts are immediately legible as monstrous.

Laughing Paintings

Winifred’s perception of the portraits laughing symbolizes both her unstable mind and the willful blindness of the upper-class characters around her. Her hallucinations make her inner disturbance vividly visible, but those in her...