It is often said that a picture is worth a thousand words. This is certainly the case with Shaun Tan’s The Arrival, which contains scores of pictures but not a single word.

Looking at the images, I can’t help thinking of the immortal words emblazoned on the Statue of Liberty:

”

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles.  From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame,
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips.  "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

When I think of immigrants, I think of all that they left behind in order to come to a better place.

Even though a person may not speak English or know the intricacies of American history, his soul yearns for freedom, and it is that freedom which makes the agony of change worthwhile. It is truly an amazing experience to see a person abandon his roots and choose to come to the United States. Some people are Americans by birth; others are American by choice.

Theodore Roosevelt once said that a person who claims that he is American and something else is not American at all, because we have room for only one flag on our soil. There is no such thing as “dual loyalty,” which is why I – along with many others – am so bothered when people refuse to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, claiming that they are really from a different country. This is nonsense bordering on treason, but I can see that the families depicted in the picture book are proud to be Americans. Their story is the story of millions, the story of learning a new language and adapting to the ways of a new land. It is a story of acculturation and assimilation, reconciling the ways of their home country with those of the United States, hanging on to the past while yearning for a brighter future. It is a story of growth, as is symbolized by the flowers in one part of the book. And it is, above all, a story of finding one’s way in the world – as we see on the last page of the bok, with the map and the suitcase. The immigrants have finally found their way home, and it is America. “This land is my land; this land is your land.” Welcome!