Who Has Seen the Wind by W.O. Mitchell: Prevailing Themes

Who Has Seen the Wind is a story of a boy and his struggle to understand and interpret the world around him. W.O. Mitchell starts by setting the stage; "Here was the least common denominator of nature, the skeleton requirements of simply land and sky (...)" (1) and follows by introducing his semi-biographical protagonist, Brian O'Connal. Brian, a boy of four, lives with his parents, grandmother and brother in a small town on the Saskatchewan prairie …

…life is not simple; it is not a question to be answered or even asked. Brian comes to recognize the facts and limitations of life and is made to face the realities that we all have to accept, including birth, cruelty and death. Between the covers of Who Has Seen the Wind, there is a boy, a prairie, and there is life; all of it's questions, delights and injustice; and all of it's perplexing glory.