quiz

Hanks uses personification to project human characteristics onto his obviously nonliving volleyball in Castaway. The volleyball acts as Hanks’ familiar after the crash and offers solace and support to him while he endures hardship after hardship. He talks to it, and though it never actually speaks back to him, it helps him think of ways to help himself. Once Hanks has left on his dangerous magical flight from the island, a whale acts as a sort of supernatural aid. It wakes him after a horrible storm and later wakes him so that he can flag down a passing freight ship, which can act as his rescuer from without. Without the whale to wake him after the storm, he never could have seen Wilson for the last time as he floated beyond his reach. Also without the whale’s help to show Hanks’ the presence of a passing boat so that he might attract its attention, there’s no way of knowing if it might just pass right by him.

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