William Bell’s No Signature

The novel No Signature ratifies the importance of human relationships through exhibiting how drastically Steve’s decisions can negatively affect his relationships with his family and friends. After Steve Chandler’s father leaves the family, Steve receives a postcard from him every month. There’s no return address, and no signature; just “DAD” stamped on the back. When Steve’s mom finds him angrily ripping up the cards, she starts throwing them out before he can see them. But one day, when he’s eighteen, he gets the mail first.

He finds another “dad” postcard, and goes in search of his father. During a short trip to Thunder Bay, the two slowly form a relationship. The painful secret that forces Steve’s father to leave his family is revealed; as a result, Steve’s resentment and bitterness leads to forgiveness and respect. Through the series of flashbacks, the reader sees Steve at various moments in his life and grows to understand his anger at his father and his own decision to distance himself emotionally from a potentially painful situation.

An important theme in William Bell’s No Signature is human relationship issues which occur between Steve and Hawk, Steve and his mother, and most significantly, Steve and his father. A major human relationship issue in the novel is between Steve and his best friend Hawk. One day Steve discovered Hawk in the boy’s locker room crying in the dark. Here Hawk’s biggest and darkest secret is exposed – he is a homosexual. The other kids on the wrestling team find gay pornographic pictures in Hawk’s locker.

Steve, disgusted with the fact, quickly backs off and flees the scene, abandoning the sorrowful Hawk. Steve thinks to himself, “Hawk Richardson is gay. The Athlete of the Year is a fag. And Wick Chandler is his best friend. ” (Bell 127) One night while Steve is in bed, he begins to speculate how he had just abandoned Hawk out of selfishness. Steve attempts to make a phone call to Hawk, but when Hawk answers Steve can’t find the courage to say anything, and Hawk hangs up.

It isn’t until Steve is in Thunder Bay that he finally calls Hawk, however instead of speaking with Hawk he speaks with Hawk’s mother and she informs him quite disheartening news – Hawk had gotten drunk and crashed head on into a bridge support beam and was placed into critical care. Steve immediately decides to leave his wrestling tournament to travel to Toronto to see Hawk. When Steve arrives at the hospital and sees Hawk, Hawk is in pretty bad shape – he is completely wrapped in hospital linens and has appeared to have broken his arm and stitches are visible on his face.

Hawk appears to be in a deep sleep, and Steve, afraid he would never see Hawk again, touches him. Steve leaves the dreary hospital and sat underneath an oak tree, once again thinking about what he had done to Hawk; he abandoned Hawk at a pivotal moment, when he needed comfort, and Steve couldn’t imagine how isolated Hawk must have felt. Steve returns to Hawk’s room – but this time Hawk is awake. Hawk admits that the reason he got drunk and drove into a bridge support beam was to get revenge on life.

Although Hawk forgives Steve, Steve still feels very guilty about Hawk’s actions and believes Hawk’s “accident” is solely his fault. Not only is this relationship issue a testament of Steve’s loyalty to Hawk, but it also teaches that true friends should always be by each other’s side regardless of the situation. Additionally, human relationship issues constantly arise between Steve and his mother. The most serious conflict occurs after Steve goes on an unauthorized excursion to Quebec City in search of his father. When Steve returns home his mother questions Steve about his actions.

Steve informs his mother that he has received a postcard from his dad – the first in years which had an address on it from Quebec City. Steve is confused why his dad would spontaneously decide to send him a postcard, but his question is quickly answered when his mother nervously tells Steve that his dad had never stopped sending the postcards, reiterating that she has been throwing them out “for him. ” (26) The angered Steve replies, “So – now let me get this straight. He’s been sending me postcards all of these years, every month or so. And, you let me think that he’d forgotten all about me?

My own father. And you did it for me? ” (26) Another relationship issue is brought up when Steve returns home from his Thunder Bay wrestling tournament with his dad, who he had crafted a strong relationship with and learned many secrets. When Steve’s mother comes home that night, Steve uses all of his might to hold back exploding at his mother. However, Steve does tell his mom that his father told him everything. Steve wants his mother to realize that he knows the truth behind his father abandoning the two ten years prior; Steve’s dad was ousted merely because of his mother’s selfishness.

Ultimately, these two relationship issues weigh heavily on Steve and his mother’s relationship. The most significant human relationship issues in No Signature is between Steve and his father. At Chutes National Park, the first issue becomes clear when Steve’s dad tries to break the silence – every time he tries to initiate a conversation, Steve pretends to be interested which angers him. Steve’s father calls his son “rude” and the aggregated Steve says that it’s difficult to become pals after ten years of being absent from each other.

Before Steve’s father wanders off into the woods, he informs Steve that, “Just for the record Steve, there’s somethin’ you ought to know. I suffered too. ” (82) When inclement weather awakes Steve in the middle of the night, he realizes that his dad isn’t in the camper. Steve bravely goes out in the storm in search of his father, and finds him lying unconscious near the waterfall. Steve uses all of his might to drag his dad back to the camper where his drunken father mumbles, “She took my little boy. My little Stevie. I hadda leave or she’d tell everybody. (82)

Steve comes to the conclusion that “she” means his mother. The most significant relationship issue in the novel is an argument between Steve and his father, where the reader learns the answer to the most notorious question in the entire novel – why did Steve’s dad abandon his wife and child? Steve asks his father to elaborate upon why he left and why he didn’t even write a return address on the postcards, and all his dad responds with is, “She made me” and, “I couldn’t. ” Finally, the agitated Steve exclaims, “Yeah, you couldn’t.

Couldn’t drop a line to your own son. What are you, for God’s sake, illiterate or–” (115) Steve’s father’s face immediately reddens with “embarrassment and humiliation” and Steve realizes his father’s secret. Steve’s father is illiterate and the reader later finds out that he was forced to abandon Steve because Steve’s mother threatened to call his work and tell everyone that he is illiterate. Adding insult to the injury, Steve’s mom had also told his father that there is no way a judge will allow an illiterate factory worker to look after a child.

After this stunning truth is unveiled, the two develop a stronger bond, and most interestingly, Steve begins to naturally address his father as “Dad” rather than “The old man. ” Steve begins to feel more comfortable asking his father questions, in which his dad willingly answers, and as a result, the two begin to trust each other. As evidenced, the issues between Steve and his father are the most important in the novel as the entire premises of the book is built around the abnormal relationship between Steve and his father, as well as the significant fact that these relationship issues affect Steve’s relationship with others.

In conclusion, the novel No Signature teaches the value and importance of having and maintaining a good relationship with others. Throughout Steve’s journey with his father, he learns many secrets and the result of this is that he and his father slowly craft a relationship and by the novel’s end the two manage to reconcile their differences and form a stronger bond, and Steve naturally calls his father, “Dad. However, after Steve learns that his mother is strongly correlated to his father’s abandonment ten years prior, this negatively affects Steve and the relationship between the two deteriorates.

Recognizing his mother’s selfishness, Steve realizes that he did the same thing to Hawk by abandoning his best friend because he didn’t want to be known as a gay’s best friend. As exemplified in this essay, human relationship issues are a prominent theme in No Signature, and are evident when Steve engages in conflicts with Hawk, his mother, and his father.