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Hannah’s Bedroom Blinds
The Rocket Slide in Eisenhower Park represents Hannah’s youth and innocence. When Hannah is new in town, she climbs to the top of it and thinks of the town she lived in before, which also had a park with one of these slides. For Hannah, the slide provides a connection to her childhood and the place she lived before she met all the people she lists on her tapes, who she partially blames for her decision to end her life. She chooses it as the location for her first kiss, which she shares with Justin, because it represents innocence to her. But though she enjoys the kiss, her memory of it gets tainted by the rumors Justin starts spreading, saying Hannah wanted to do more than kissing that night, which prompt other people to call Hannah a “slut.” By descending down the slide and away from the rocket ship to meet Justin, Hannah takes her first step away from the carefree, innocent version of herself—through no fault of her own.
The Rocket Slide Quotes in Thirteen Reasons Why
The Thirteen Reasons Why quotes below all refer to the symbol of The Rocket Slide. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Cassette 1: Side A
Quotes
The dream starts with me at the top of the rocket, holding on to the steering wheel. It’s still a playground rocket, not a real one, but every time I turn the wheel to the left, the trees in the park lift up their roots and sidestep it to the left. When I turn the wheel to the right, they sidestep it to the right.
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Cassette 7: Side A
Quotes
I’m walking down the hall.
Her voice is clear. It’s louder.
His door is closed behind me. It’s staying closed.
A pause.
He’s not coming.
I press my face hard against the bars. They feel like a vise tightening against my skull the further I push.
He’s letting me go.
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Get the entire Thirteen Reasons Why LitChart as a printable PDF.
The Rocket Slide Symbol Timeline in Thirteen Reasons Why
The timeline below shows where the symbol The Rocket Slide appears in Thirteen Reasons Why. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Cassette 1: Side A
...hers 10 minutes later. She answers that the trains meet at the bottom of the rocket ship slide in Eisenhower Park in 15 minutes, and Justin says that seemed “awfully slow.” Hannah tells...
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Hannah explains that the rocket ship is similar to the one in her old town. On summer nights before her freshman...
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Cassette 7: Side A
...Most of the park’s lamps are burnt out, but moonlight bathes the top of the rocket slide . Clay climbs to the second level. Once he’s up there, he presses Play on...
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...wants someone to hear her and understand. Clay climbs to the top level of the rocket slide . On the tape, Mr. Porter asks Hannah what led to her feeling this way....
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