Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death, child abuse, and suicidal ideation.

The Spear Cuts Through Water is a frame narrative in which the act of storytelling is central to the story itself. Stories appear in many forms, including the story performed on stage, Lola’s stories to the grandchild, stories shared by characters throughout the nested narrative, and even the stories that characters tell themselves in the privacy of their own thoughts.

These examples demonstrate the power and purpose of storytelling in creating identity, both for communities and for individuals. Both the central nested story and Lola’s stories to the grandchild demonstrate the power of stories to craft cultural identity. Lola insists on telling her stories of the Old Country to the grandchild, despite the grandchild’s reluctance and occasional disinterest, because she wishes to pass on the cultural memory of her homeland. The family has lived as immigrants in the Unified Continent for several generations, and Lola fears losing their connections to that cultural identity. She attempts to rebuild that identity in the grandchild through stories.

The grandchild expresses not only disinterest but also embarrassment over these stories.