The Cay is a survival story. The plot revolves around how Phillip and Timothy first survive on a raft and then on a tiny island for a period of several months. The text is set during World War II, a time when many people had to try to survive under increasingly difficult circumstances. This context broadens the theme of survival to a local and ultimately global scale; after the air attack, Curaçao's water supply is cut off, and the residents become “stranded” on their own island without access to a basic element of human survival. Elsewhere in the world, both soldiers and ordinary people—such as Henrick’s friends and relatives in the Netherlands—fight to survive the violence and privations of war. For Phillip and Timothy, the battle for their lives becomes immediate after the Hato is torpedoed. They can only survive by learning to rely on and trust each other rather than letting their differences separate them. The barrier of racism makes Phillip and Timothy’s initial situation an allegory to war though the hostility in this case is one-sided. A subtler message of Phillip’s journey of Overcoming Racism is that, if the opposing sides of Black and white can get along, so can world powers.