Nature Shows (Allegory)
Jules advises Harold to stay home from work one day to check and see if there is an external plot that is acting on his life. Harold stays home and tries to do as little as possible to test Jules' theory, sitting on the couch watching television. However, there is an unavoidable and aggressive television program on as he watches: one about predators and prey in the animal kingdom. As Harold watches a fiddler crab go after a wounded bird on the beach, horrified, we see that the nature program is an allegory of Harold's situation. The predatory fiddler crab represents the narrator who is toying with his life, while the helpless wounded bird stands in for Harold. Rendered powerless to affect change in his own life, Harold feels like a hunted prey, wounded and powerless.
The Novel (Allegory)
The plot of the film—that Harold's life is also a novel, with a beginning, middle, and end—is itself an allegory for life and existence. By confronting the meta-theatrical device of the omniscient narrator in his own story, Harold Crick confronts his own existence. The "novel" of Harold's life that Karen Eiffel is working on is not just a story but an existence, an actual experience. In this allegory, Karen Eiffel becomes a stand-in for the divine, for "God," and for fate. She controls Harold's fate more than Harold does, which mirrors the belief in a Judeo-Christian "God" who watches over, sees, and controls all of the actions of mankind. Harold, then, becomes a stand-in for mankind, or the "everyman." His journey becomes allegorical, representing the experience of life itself.
Cookies (Symbol)
Ana Pascal is passionate about baking. She loves giving back to the people in her community, and as she tells Harold Crick, she began baking when she was a mediocre law student at Harvard Law, hoping to improve her classmates' educations by giving them a little extra sugar. A benevolent hobby evolved into a full-time career and by the time Harold meets her, Ana has repurposed her desire to help people with the law into a career helping people through making delicious baked goods. After a long day of going through Ana's especially chaotic tax files, Harold comes downstairs to find that Ana has baked him some cookies, which she forces him to eat. In this moment, and indeed, in her whole life, cookies symbolize care and altruism, and they are Ana's way of making sure she's improving people's lives.
Wristwatch (Symbol)
At the end of Karen Eiffel's novel, which just happens to be Harold Crick's life, she decides to change his fate. Instead of having him die a tragic death from putting the wrong time into his wristwatch, Eiffel writes his fate so that part of the wristwatch gets lodged in Harold's artery just as he is hit by the bus, preventing excessive bleeding and saving his life. While up until this point the wristwatch has been a symbol of Harold's imminent death, at this final climactic moment, the wristwatch becomes a symbol of Harold's redemption. Previously, the wristwatch has represented the unavoidable forward momentum of time. At the end, however, it comes to symbolize Harold's heroic act, his willingness to die to save the life of a young boy.
Guitar (Symbol)
Harold begins to play guitar after talking with Dave about what he would do if he knew he was going to die. A lifelong dream, the guitar that Harold purchases is a symbol of Harold's desires, which have previously been buried under his humorless and clinical approach to life. The guitar represents Harold's ability to come out of his shell, believe in himself, and take some pleasure in life.
