79 pages • 2 hours read
Neverwhere
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Symbols & Motifs
Anaesthesia’s Quartz Bead
When the darkness claims Anaesthesia’s life on the bridge to the Floating Market, a bead falls off her necklace, and this is the only remaining sign that she ever existed. This moment stands as a crucial turning point for Richard, who realizes that the young girl willingly risked her life to guide him and ultimately lost everything for his sake. He is also deeply struck by the pragmatic and callous attitude of London Below’s denizens, for those who were part of Anaesthesia’s community see her death as a normal occurrence, and Richard realizes that she was only tasked to guide him because they considered her to be expendable. Faced with the knowledge that his actions indirectly led to the girl’s death, Richard keeps the bead as a form of remembrance, honoring her courage and self-sacrifice: two traits that Richard will eventually need to exhibit in order to pass the Ordeal of the Key that the Black Friars set him to complete. In this later scene, he is faced with a vision that tries to convince him to die by suicide, but just as he is about to heed this suggestion, he touches the bead and is reminded of Anaesthesia’s sacrifice. Determined not to let her death be in vain, he finds the courage and inspiration to overcome the ordeal and obtain the key. The bead therefore becomes a symbol of The Transformative Nature of Sacrifice.
Rats
From the very beginning of the novel, Gaiman makes it clear that the denizens of London Below are unremarked upon and essentially invisible whenever they venture into London Above, and many of them—like the Lord Rat-Speaker and the young Anaesthesia—have intimate connections with rats, whom they understand to be the secret “movers and shakers” of this magical world. Far from being reviled or exterminated, rats are honored and deeply respected by those in London Below, and they appear at key moments throughout the narrative to deliver messages or render aid to the protagonists and secondary characters. A prime example occurs when the Marquis de Carabas goes to see “the Golden,” the supernatural rats who are implied to be powerful forces within this realm. When he calls in his favor with the Golden, it is eventually revealed that these entities hold the very power of life and death, for they provide the Marquis with the magic he needs to arrange for his resurrection after Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar murder him. Ultimately, rats represent the hidden power of beings that are commonly scorned or overlooked.
The Floating Market
As the beating heart of an invisible world, the Floating Market captures the unpredictability, danger, and wonder of London Below. Shifting inexplicably from place to place, its physical inconstancy is nonetheless juxtaposed with the fact that it represents the only true form of continuity for those who flock to its vendors. Regardless of where the market next chooses to materialize, the residents of London Below instinctively know where and when it will be, and they come together in this place to share goods, services, and information. In short, the Floating Market is one of the few features of London Below that ties the entire world together as a collective society and imposes a cursory form of order upon the chaos that rules these people’s lives.
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By Neil Gaiman
